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Sdences 
Corporation 


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Stalls 
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Image 


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Library  Division 

Provinrial  Archives  of  British  Columbia 

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pramlAre  page  qui  comporte  une  empreinte 
d'impression  ou  d'iliustration  at  en  terminant  par 
la  darniire  page  qui  comporte  une  telle 
empreinte. 

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darniire  image  de  cheque  microfiche,  selon  le 
cas:  la  symbols  — »>  signifie  "A  SUIVRE  ",  le 
symboie  V  signifie  "FIN  ". 

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film«s  A  des  taux  da  reduction  diff«rants. 
Lorsque  le  document  est  trop  grand  pour  Atra 
reprodult  en  un  seul  clich«,  ii  est  film«  A  partir 
de  I'angie  supArieur  gauche,  de  gauche  A  droite, 
et  de  haut  an  bas.  en  prenant  le  nombre 
d'imeges  nAcessaire.  Les  diagrammas  suivants 
illustrent  ia  mAthoda. 


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in  A 


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32X 


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SPEECH 


f 


!*'-« 


MR. CHOATE,   OF   MASSACHUSETTS, 


THE   QUESTION  OF    ANNULLING' 


CONVENTION  FOR  THE   COMMON   OCCUPATION  OP   THE 
TERRITORY  OF  OREGON; 


AND 


IN  REPLY  TO  MR.  BUCHANAN. 


SBBtlTimBS 


IN  THE  SENATE  OP  THE  UNITED  STATE 


Much  31.   1844. 


WASHINGTON: 

tBIirrKD    IT  OALIS  AVD  tlAT»«. 


1844. 


PROyi.NCiAL  Ar:CI!iyESOFB.C. 


mttm^mmmemtlmm 


iiteiil 


'..  t.  ■■ 


Crx'  (?i 


8fr 


10 ' 


[The  third  article  of  the  Convention  between  the  United  States  and 
Great  Britain,  signed  October  20(h,  1818,  is  in  these  words: 

"  It  i»  igroed  that  uiy  country  that  may  be  claimfd' by  either  party  on  the  Northweat  eoait  of 
America,  weatward  of  the  Stony|Mountaini,  shall,  together  with  iu  barbora,  baya,  and  creaka, 
and  the  navigation  of  all  rivcra  within  the  aame,  io  free  and  open  for  the  term  of  ten  yeam from 
the  date  of  the  lignaturo  of  the  preaent  Convention,  to  the  vcaacls,  citizen*,  and  mibjocta  of  the  tw* 
Powers ;  it  being  well  undcntood,  that  this  agreement  ia  not  to  be  ronitnicd  to  the  prejudice  of  any 
claim  which  either  of  the  two  high|[contracting  ]iartics  may  have  to  any  part  cf  the  mid  countiy, 
nor  shall  it  be  taken  to  affect  the  clnima  of  any  other  Tower  or  State  to  any  part  of  the  aaid  coun^ 
try  {  the  only  object  of  tlie  high  contracting  parties  in  that  respect  being  to  prevent  disputoa  and 
differences  among  themselves." 

The  Convention  between  the  same  Governments,  signed  August  6th, 
1827,  is  in  these  woids: 

"  AkT.  1.  All  tlic  provisions  of  the  thin)  nrtiile  of  the  Convention  concluded  between  the  United 
Statea  of  Amarira  and  Ilia  Majesty  the  King  of  tlio  United  Kingdom  of  Great  Britain  and  Ireland, 
on  the  20th  of  October,  1818,  shall  bo,  and  they  arc  hereby,  further  indefinitely  extended  and 
continued  in  force,  iu  tlic  same  manner  as  if  ull  the  provisions  of  the  ssid  article  were  herein  spe- 
cifically recited. 

'■  AaT.  8.  It  shall  be  competent,  however,  to  either  of  tlic  contracting  parties,  in  case  cither  ahonld 
think  fit,  at  any  time  after  the  20th  of  October,  1R38,  on  giving  due  notice  of  twelve  months  to 
the  other  contracting  party,  to  annul  and  abrogate  this  Convention  ;  and  it  shall,  in  such  case,  b« 
accordingly  entirely  annulled  and  abrogatedi  after  the  expiration  of  the  said  term  of  notice. 

"  Abt.  3.  Nothing  contained  in  this  Convcation,  or  in  the  third  article  of  the  Convention  of  the 
30th  October,  1818,  hereby  rontinunl  in  forc^,  shall  be  construed  to  impair  or  in  any  manner  af- 
fect the  claims  which  either  of  the  contracting  parties  may  have  to  ai)y  part  of  the  country  west- 
ward of  the  Stony  Mountains." 

On  the  8th  of  January,  1844,  Mr.  Semple,  of  Illinois,  introduced  into 
the  Senate  of  the  United  States  the  following  resolution: 

"  Resolved,  That  the  President  of  the  United  States  he  requested  to  give  notice  to  the  British  Gov- 
ernment that  it  is  the  desire  of  the  Government  of  the  United  States  to  annul  and  abrogate  the 
provisions  of  the  third  article  of  the  Convention  concluded  between  the  Government  of  the  United 
Statet  of  America  and  His  Brit.mnic  Majesty  the  King  of  the  United  Kingdom  of  Great  Britain 
and  Ireland,  on  the  20th  of  Octolior,  1816,  and  indefinitely  continued  by  the  Convention  between 
the  same  parties,  signed  at  London  the  Cth  of  August,  1897." 

In  opposilion  to  this  resolution,  Mr.  Choate  addressed  the  Senate  on 
the  22d  of  February,  in  reply  to  Mr.  Atchison,  of  Missouri.  The  debate 
was  continued  by  Messrs.  Hanneoan,  Breese,  and  Buchanan  in  favor 
of  the  resolution,  and  Messrs.  Dattov,  Miller,  Archer,  Crittcndkit,. 
and  Rites,  against  it ;  after  which,  this  speech  was  delivered.] 


SPEECH 


Mr.  President : 

It  is  not  my  purpose  to  discuss  this  subject,  at  large,  over  again.  I  have 
been  once  heard  on  it  ;  and,  with  you  all,  I  have  a  very  strong  desire  to 
bring  such  a  dangerous  and  unseasonable  debate  to  a  close.  A  few  words 
in  explanation  and  aid  of  what  I  said  before,  seem,  however,  to  have  been 
made  necessary  by  the  speeches  of  the  advocates  of  the  resolution. 

I  acknowledge  an  anxiety  to  define  and  restate  plainly,  briefly,  and  di- 
rectly, the  position  which  I  actually  assumed  upon  this  business.  With- 
out supposing  any  intention  to  misrepresent,  which  can  never  exist  here, 
sure  I  am  that  no  human  being  could  form  any  tolerable  conjecture  of  its 
nature,  limits,  and  grounds,  from  all  the  replies,  solemn,  fervid,  and  sar- 
castic, that  have  been  made  to  it. 

Sir,  my  view  of  this  matter  was,  and  is,  simply  and  exactly  this  :  not 
that  we  should  now  determine  that  we  will  never  give  the  notice  to  annul 
the  Convention ;  for  who  can  say  that  we  may  not  be  required  to  give  it 
in  six  months  ?  but  that  we  should  not  give  the  notice  now.  Whether  we 
shall  ever  give  it,  when  and  with  what  accompaniments  of  preparation, 
and  of  auxiliary  action  we  shall  do  so,  I  said  were  matters  .very  fit  for  a 
committee  to  consider,  or  for  events  to  be  allowed  to  develop.  Possibly 
the  course  of  events  might  render  such  notice  forever  unnecessary.  There 
was  nothing  in  the  past  or  the  present  to  indicate  the  contrary  with  cer- 
tainty. Let  us  await  then,  I  suggested,  the  admonitions  of  events,  as  they 
should  be  uttered  from  time  to  time  ;  keeping  always  a  sharp  lookout  on 
Oregon,  which  a  noiseless  and  growing  current  of  agricultural  immigra- 
tion was  filling  with  hands  and  hearts  the  fittest  to  defend  it.  This  was 
my  view  ;  that  is  to  say,  that  the  notice  should  not  be  given  now.  To- 
wards that  single  point  all  that  was  urged  was  made  to  bear,  and  upon 
that  all  was  meant  to  tell. 

And  this  view  met  the  whole  question  before  us.  What  is  that  ques-^ 
tion  ?  Not  whether  the  notice  shall  be  given  now  or  never  given  at  M. 
Not  so.  The  alternative  is  not  between  now  giving  it,  and  never  giving 
it ;  but  between  giving  it  now,  and  not  giving  it  now.  That  is  the  single 
point  of  difference.  Senators  upon  the  other  side  would  annul  the  Cod' 
vention  to-day  ;  we  would  not  annul  it  to-day  ;  and  there  we  stop.  The 
duties  of  to-morrow  we  can  better  discern  and  better  perform  by  the  lights 
of  to-morrow. 

It  is  palpable,  Mr.  President,  upon  this  bare  restatement  of  the  ques- 
tion, that  R'uch  which  made  the  matter  of  the  speech  of  the  honorable 
Senator  from  Pennsylvania,  (Mr.  Buchanan,)  much  perhaps  which  I  said 


* 


1. 


myself,  was  not  very  immediately  or  decisively  relevant ;  certainly  not 
very  necessary  to  a  suitable  detetmination  of  it.  He  may  be  right  or  ho 
may  be  wrong  in  unfolding  himself  with  so  much  emphasis  against  what 
he  is  pleased  to  call  a  poetical  and  a  self-deceiving  theory  of  policy  ;  I 
may  have  been  right  or  may  have  been  wrong  in  calculating  so  sanguine* 
ly  on  the  unassisted  enterprise  and  the  restless  nature  of  my  countrymen ; 
1  may  have  been  right  or  may  have  been  wrong  in  supposing  that  those 
mysterious  tendencies  and  energies  that  have  carried  our  people  to  the 
eastern  base  of  the  Rocky  Mountains  would  not  die  away  there,  as  sum- 
mer evening  waves  on  the  shore,  but  would  carry  them,  with  your  aid  or 
without  it,  to  the  great  sea  ;  the  honorable  Senator  may  or  may  not  be 
right  in  predicting  that  Great  Britain  will  develop  some  new  motive  and 
new  form  of  resistance  to  our  occupation  of  the  Oregon,  or  that  the  Hud- 
son's Bay  Company  will  take  up  some  new  or  some  old  habit  of  Indian 
butcheries  to  keep  us  out;  you  may  think  what  you  will'  on  all  this,  and 
yet  you  have  not  settled  nor  very  closely  approached  the  question,  whether 
the  notice  of  abrogation  shall  now  be  given  under  the  actual,  special,  tem- 
porary, and  passing  circumstances  of  the  case  and  the  hour. 

Returning  to  that,  the  only  question,  I  stand  as  I  stood,  upon  one  single, 
sufficient,  and  decisive  reason  against  the  notice  ;  and  that  is,  that  it  may 
by  possibility  produce  an  inauspicious  eflfcct  upon  the  negotiation  just  now 
beginning  or  begun ;  and  therefore,  as  you  have  maintained  this  Conven- 
tion for  the  peaceful  and  common  occupation  of  the  Oregon  Territory  for 
eix-and-twenty  years,  under  all  administrations.,  in  all  aspects  of  facts, 
steadily  and  with  great  unanimity  of  opinion,  as  a  part  of  your  entire  Or- 
egon policy  ;  as  there  is  nothing  whatever  in  the  past  or  the  present  to 
disclose  any  necessity  for  annulling  it,  or  any  ground  of  reasonable  expec- 
tation of  benefit  from  doing  so ;  as  it  has  operated  and  is  operating  well 
for  you  to-day  ;  it  ought  not,  on  the  eve  of  negotiation,  to  be  abruptly  and 
capriciously. abrogated.  Such  an  act  may,  by  possibility,  prevent  a  treaty. 
It  may  diminish  the  chances  of  a  treaty.  It  cannot  help  negotiation,  and 
it  may  embarrass  and  break  it  up.  For  this  single  reason,  without  another, 
I  opposed  and  oppose  the  resolution. 

And  what  does  the  "honorable  Senator  from  Pennsylvania  say  to  this? 
Why,  that  the  Senator  from  Massachusetts  has  declared  that  we  have 
slept  upon  our  rijchts  for  twenty-six  years  ;  and  that  therefore,  while  we 
are  about  it,  we  may  as  well  have  a  little  more  sleep,  a  little  more  slum- 
ber, and  a  little  more  folding  of  the  hands  to  sleep  ! 

Now,  sir,  let  me  respectfully  tell  the  honorable  Senator  that  this  is  not 
even  a  good  caricature  of  my  reasoning.  It  is  quite  idle,  I>know,  to  com- 
plain that  an  opponent  does  not  restate  the  position  which  he  assails  in  ex- 
actly the  terms  in  which  it  was  propound'^d  ;  and  yet  I  always  thought  it  a 
pleasing  and  honorable  thing  which  I  have  heard  said  of  an  eminent  deba- 
ter in  the  British  House  of  Commons,  and  also  of  a  late  accomplished 
member  of  the  American  legal  profession,  that  they  would  reannounce 
the  argument  to  which  they  were  replying,  better  than  its  author  had  ex- 
pressed it,  before  tHey  proceeded  to  demolish  it  irreparably.  But  this, 
sir,  of  the  honorable  Senator,  tried  by  the  rules  of  the  noble  art  of  logical 
and  Parliamentary  caricature,  is  a  bad  one.  I  made  no  such  assertion, 
and  deduced  no  such  inference,     i  said  not  one  word  of  our  having  slept 


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erfninlj  not 
i^'ght  or  he 
gainst  what 
f  policy ;  I 
o  sanguine- 
ountrymen ; 
;  that  those 
Jople  to  the 
•^e,  as  sum- 
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may  not  be 
notive  and 
t  the  Hud- 
of  Indian 
II  this,  and 
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one  single, 
Ihat  it  may 
"  just  now 
s  Conven- 
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s  of  facts, 
entire  Or- 
prcsent  to 
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ruptly  and 
it  a  treaty, 
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It  another, 

y  to  this? 

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while  we 

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>ught  it  a 
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■nnounce 
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But  this, 
>f  logical 
ssertion, 
ing  slept 


6 

on   our  rights  six-and-twenly  years,  or  six-and-twenty  minutes — if  by 
sleeping  on  rights  I  am  to  understand  the  neglecting  to  assert  and  pro* 
claim  them.    I  was  speaking  of  this  Convention  for  common  occupation, 
and  I  said,  and  said  only,  and  exactly,  that  upon  this  Convention  you  had 
stood,  all  parties,  all  administrations,  from   1818  to  this  hour,  as  apart  of 
your  entire  Oregon  policy ;  that  you  had  done  so  with  a  knowledge  of 
every  fact  which  is  now  urged  as  a  reason  of  annulling  it ;  and  that  there* 
fore  to  annul  it  now,  when  its  practical  operation  is  better  for  you  than 
ever  before  it  waj>,  and  when  a  negotiation  is  just  beginning,  (to  carry  you 
in  good  temper  through  which  was  one  of  the  leading  inducements  to  , 
making  and  continuing  it,)  would  be  a  capricious,  unintelligible,  and  un* 
wise  proceeding.     This  is  what  I  said.    .With  sleeping  on  your  rights  1 
never  taunted  you.    Every  body  knows  that  we  have  not  slept  on  them. 
Every  body  knows  that  we  have  recorded  them ;  announced  them  to 
Great  Britain,  and  to  the  world  ;  urged  them  in  every  diplomatic  conver- 
sation we  have  had  with  that  Government  since  we  knew  there  was  a  Co- 
lumbia river ;  and  that  we  made  and  renewed  this  very  Convention  with 
an  express  protestation  and  provision  that  it  should  not  impair  or  change 
them.     Sir,  let  me,  the  more  completely  to  satisfy  the  honorable  Senator 
of  his  misapprehension  of  the  remark  to  which  he  excepted,  do  so  unu- 
sual a  thing  as  to  read  from  the  Congressional  Globe  a  brief  extract  from 
a  speech  which  I  had  the  honor  to  make  in  this  place  at  the  last  session : 

"  Always  this  quc«tion  of  the  Oregon  has  borne  exactly  the  aarae  relation  to  all  our  queitioni 
with  England  that  it  bore  liwt  summer.  Always  it  has  been  thought  important  enough  to  be  discuiaed 
with  other  subjects,  and  never  has  it  licen  quite  matured  for  adjustment,  and  never  thought  quite 
so  important  as  to  hinder  the  adjustment  of  other  questions  which  were  matured.  How  many  treatiei 
have  you  made  with  England — how  mucli  diplomatic  conversation  have  you  had  with  her  since  Captain 
Gray  discovered  and  named  the  Columbia  river  ?  And  yet,  through  the  whole  series — in  1807t 
1614,  1816,  1318,  and  1826— in  the  administrations  of  both  tlie  last  Presidents,  always  there  hat 
been  one  course  and  one  result  with  this  subject.  It  has  been  treated  of ;  formal  and  informa 
communications  have  been  held  on  it ;  it  has  been  found  to  be  unripe  for  settlement ;  and  it  has 
been  found  to  be,  or  believed  to  be,  not  difficult  enough,  or  not  pressing  enough,  to  delay  or  alter 
the  settlement  of  riper  and  more  pressing  elements  of  contention." 

Sir,  while  I  hold  this  book  open,  let  me  digress  a  momerit  to  correct 
another  misapprehension,  into  which  the  honorable  Senator  inadvertently 
fell,  n  at  all  affecting,  it  is  true,  the  immediate  discussion.  Eager  as  he 
was  to  show  that  the  American  Government  had  never  slept  upon  our 
rights,  because  this  seemed  to  controvert  a  position  I  had  never  taken,  he 
could  not  deny  himself  the  pleasure  of  conjecturing  that  in  1842  the  then 
Secretary  of  State  had  proposed  the  parallel  of  49°  north  as  the  bounda- 
ry ;  and  this  conjecture  he  founded  wholly  upon  a  sentence  contained  in 
the  speech  from  which  I  have  just  been  reading.     The  sentence  is  this : 

"  I  desired  chiefly  to  assure  the  Senator  and  the  Senate  that  the  apprehension  intimated  by  him, 
that  a  disclosure  of  these  informal  communications  would  disgrace  the  American  Secretary,  by 
■howmg  that  he  had  offered  a  boundary  line  south  of  the  parallel  of  forty-nine,  is  totally  unfound. 
ed.  He  would  be  glad  to  hear  me  say  that  I  am  authorized  and  desired  to  declare,  that  in  no  com. 
munication,  formal  or  informal,  was  such  an  offer  made,  and  that  none  such  was  ever  mediUtcd." 


«    ii^ 


From  this  he  inrers  that  the  degree  of  49  woa  proposed.  Certainljr, 
sir,  his  inference  is  wholly  groundless.  The  facts  are  these.  The  Sen- 
ator  from  Missouri,  (Mr.  Pknton, )  whom  the  Senate,  with  a  general  and 
sincere  pleasure,  have  seen  'esume  his  seat  this  morning,  had,  at  the  last 
session,  made  a  speech,  the  .nain  effort  of  which  was  to  prove  that  Great 
Britain  had  no  color  of  title,  at  least  south  of  49°.  He  did  not,  certainly, 
concede  her  title  so  far  as  49°,  but  his  argument  was  almost  exclusively 
directed  to  a  vindication  of  the  American  title  up  to  that  parallel ;  that 
is,  *o  the  whole  valley  of  the  Columbia  liver.  In  the  course  of  his  re- 
marks he  observed  that  our  Government  had  steadily  refused  to  concede 
a  particle  of  right  to  Great  Britain  soutli  of  49°,  but  that  he  feared  that  a 
proposition  had  been  made  by  the  American  negotiator  of  the  treaty  of 
1842  to  fall  below  that  degree]  and  thereupon  he  used  this  language, 
which  I  read  from  the  Congressional  Globe :  "  And  now  if,  after  all  this, 
any  proposition  has  been  made  by  our  Government  to  give  up  the  north 
bank  of  the  river,  I  for  one  shill  not  fail  to  brand  such  a  proposition  with 
the  name  of  treason." 

The  object  of  his  denunciation,  the  Senate  perceive,  was  a  supposed 
proposition  to  run  a  line  south  of  49°.  Of  any  proposition  to  adopt  49°  it- 
self, or  any  higher  parallel,  he  was  not  thinking,  and  did  not  speak.  In- 
tending to  participate  in  that  discussion,  I  addressed  a  note  to  the  Secre- 
tary of  State,  inquiring  simply  whether  a  proposition  had  been  made  to 
take  a  line  south  of  the  49tb  degree .'  The  answer  was  immediate,  and  to 
the  precise  question,  that  none  such  bad  been  made  or  meditated.  Not 
another  syllable  was  said  or  written,  and  the  writer  of  neither  note,  I  may 
venture  to  say,  intended  to  ask  or  answer  any  thing  but  the  precise  ques- 
tion, or  had  any  other  subject  in  his  mind  at  all.  *  1  well  remember  that 
when  this  was  announced,  in  the  terms  which  the  honorable  Senator  has 
read,  the  Senator  from  Missouri  audibly  expressed  his  satisfaction.  Surely 
those  terms,  upoa  this  explanation,  cannot  be  thought  to  afford  the  slight- 
est evidence  that  this  Government  proposed  the  49th  degree  for  a  bound- 
ary, and  I  have  been  recently  assured,  and  from  high  authority,  that 
such  is  not  the  fact. 

Returning  from  this  digression,  sir,  and  taking  leave,  once  and  for  all, 
of  the  treaty  of  1842,  I  may  repeat  that  the  assertion  which  I  actually 
made  in  debate  the  other  day  was  only,  that  we  have  continued  this  Con- 
vention as  a  means  of  enabling  us,  in  one  mode  or  another,  to  secure  and 
enforce  those  very  rights  in  the  Oregon  Territory  which  we  have  always 
asserted.  We  have  kept  up  the  Convention,  not  because  we  were  asleep, 
but  because  we  were  awake.  All  the  reasons  now  urged  by  Senators  for 
abrogating  it  we  have  known  perfectly  well,  and  long  ago.  In  1818,  we 
made  the  Convention.  In  1827,  we  renewed  it.  In  1829,  in  February, 
just  upon  the  accession  of  Gen.  Jackson,  that  celebrated  letter  of  Messrs. 
Clark  and  Cass  to  the  Senator  from  Missouri  (Mr.  Benton)  was  written, 
from  which  is  derived  the  fact,  thrice  repeated,  I  believe,  by  the  honora- 
ble Senator  from  Pennsylvania,  that  five  hundred  of  our  citizens,  hunters, 
traders,  and  trappers,  have  been  murdered  by  Indians  among  and  on  each 
side  of  the  Rocky  Mountains,  and  about  the  upper  Missouri  and  Missis- 
sippi, and  perhaps  by  the  instigation  of  British  traders.  That  letter  was 
written  then.    This  fact  was  made  known  to  Congress  and  the  country 


iertainljr, 
The  Sen- 
neral  and 
it  the  last 
hat  Great 
certainly, 
clusively 
lei;  that 
if  his  re- 
concede 
red  that  a 
treaty  of 
anguage, 
r  all  this, 
(he  north 
'ion  with 


1 1  may 


then;  yet  you  did  not  abrogate  the  Convention.  In  1838,  the  Hudson 
Bay  Company  obtained  a  renewal  of  its  charter  for  twenty  years,  the  Brit* 
isb  Government  reset  ving,  however,  the  right,  as  against  the  company, 
of  colonizing  the  territory  embraced  by  the  charter ;  which  is  another  of 
the  honorable  Senator's  reasons  for  abrogation.  This  was  six  years  ago, 
in  Mr.  Van  Burcn's  term,  yet  you  did  not  abrogate  it.  In  1839,  during 
the  same  administration,  elaborate  reports  were  made  to  Congress  from 
the  department  for  Indian  Affairs,  upon  the  precise  subject  on  which  the 
Senator  from  Ohio  (Mr.  Allen)  has  called  for  and  obtained  information  at 
this  session,  to  wit,  the  practice  of  the  British  Government  and  British 
companies  to  make  presents  to  Indians  residing  within  our  territory,  and 
their  general  Indian  policy,  its  principles,  and  its  workings.  This  whole 
subject  was  fully  laid  open  before  you  then,  and  yet  you  did  not  abrogate 
the  Convention.  Ten  years  ago,  just  as  well  as  to-day,  you  knew  that 
our  hunters  and  trappers  could  not  and  did  not  contend  successfully  with 
the  Hudson  Bay  Company  for  the  furs  of  the  Oregon.  Yet  you  did  not 
abrogate  it. 

So  true  it  is,  sir,  that  without  a  particle  of  evidence  of  one  single  new 
reason  against  the  Convention,  without  producing  one  single  fact  not  per* 
fectly  well  known  for  years.  Senators  now,  now,  just  when,  upon  the 
proofs  which  I  htkve  laid  and  shall  lay  before  you,  it  is  conclusively 
evinced  that  the  Convention  is  operating  in  your  favor  in  the  Oregon,  far 
more  energetically  and  far  more  palpably  than  ever  before,  multiplying 
your  numbers,  extending  your  influence ;  now,  too,  just  when  for  the  first 
time  you  are  able  to  sit  down  to  a  negotiation  on  this  single  subject,  dis- 
embarrassed of  all  other  elements  of  controversy,  this  well  chosen  mo- 
ment is  that  which  Senators  seize  on  to  take  the  first  step  towards  abro- 
gatior.  I  said  the  thing  was  incomprehensible  and  capricious,  and  I  say 
flo  still. 

So  much  in  correction  of  the  misapprehension  of  the  honorable  Senator. 

Well,  then,  why  would  the  honorable  Senator  give  the  notice  of  ab- 
rogation i 

Sir,  he  tells  you  why.  It  is  to  induce  Great  Britain  to  make  a  good 
Oregon  treaty.  It  is  for  the  sake  of  influencing  that  Government  to  do 
what  it  would  not  do  without.  If  you  do  not  give  the  notice,  he  will  risk 
his  life  that  she  will  not  give  you  a  good  treaty.  If  you  do,  she  will,  or 
she  may.     This  is  his  exact  and  exquisite  reason. 

^ut,  sir,  when  we,  wondering  and  incredulous,  ask  how  the  notice  is 
to  exert  so  desirable  an  influence  upon  Great  Britain,  the  honorable  Sen- 
ator seems  to  me  to  become  far  less  explicit  than  could  be  wished,  or  than 
was  to  have  been  expected.  What  is  the  precise  information  which  the 
notice  is  to  give  her  ?  What  is  it  to  tell  her  that  we  mean  to  do  ?  The 
honorable  Senator  does  not  say.  I  miss  something  here  of  his  habitual  di- 
rectness and  clearness  of  speech,  and  frankness  of  explanation.  May  I 
not  even  complain  of  this  ?  True,  we  have  no  great  difficulty  in  making 
out  the  ominous  and  energetic  meaning  of  the  notice.  We  make  .ut  well 
enough,  upon  the  whole,  that  it  is  a  declarp^'^n  that  unless  within  a  year 
Great  Britain  yields  a  satisfactory  treaty,  Wb  mU  at  the  end  of  that  time 
assert  by  force  the  exclusive  occupation  of  the  contested  region.  This 
we  see.     But  we  have  to  make  it  out  by  argument  and  inference,  and  by 


fmx^mmm 


putting  this  part  of  the  speech  of  the  honorable  Senator  with  that  part,, 
and  reasoning  up  from  consequences  to  caujes.  Sir,  I  complain  of  this. 
Surely,  surely  in  a  matter  of  such  transcendent  importance,  those  who  in- 
fluence the  public  councils  and  hold  the  public  fortunes  in  their  hands,' 
owe  the  country  the  utmost  possible  frankness  and  truthfulness  of  dealing. 
This  no'-:e,  in  thv  opinion  of  all  here,  is  to  work  a  great  chnnge  in  your 
relations  to  one  of  the  first  Powers  in  the  world  ;  it  is  to  modify  a  pending 
negotiation,  on  the  course  and  issue  of  which  many  anxious  hearts,  many 
vast  and  delicate  interests,  are  suspended  ;  it  may  in  its  results  leave  you 
in  all  things  worse  than  it  found  you  :  it  may  give  you,  for  peace,  a  sword. 
Then,  sir,  you  owe  to  the  people  the  most  unreserved  declaration  of  your 
opinion  of  its  exact  and  entire  meaning;  of  the  exact  extent  and  nature 
of  the  information  wh''  it  conveys  to  Great  Britain  ;  oi  the  degree,  and 
the  way  in  which  it  commits  you ;  of  how  fur  and  in  what  direction  it  en- 
gages your  pride  and  honor  to  go,  if  it  does  not  happen  to  produce  the 
treaty  which  you  expect.  Sir,  this  business  of  war  and  peace  is  the  peo- 
ple's business.  All  measures  legislative  in  their  nature,  as  you  assume 
this  to  be,  at  oil  tending  to  endanger  the  state  of  peace,  are  for  them  to 
judge  on,  from  the  beginning  to  the  end.  Yes,  sir,  this  all  is  their  busi- 
ness. !( is  the  business  of  the  farmer,  preparing  to  scatter  his  seed  with 
tears,  and  looking  forward  to  the  harvest  when  he  may  come  bearing  hiS- 
sheaves  with  joy,  his  happy  household  unsevered  around  him ;  it  is  the 
business  of  the  planter;  it  is  the  business  of  the  merchant  in  his  count- 
ing room,  projecting  the  enterprises  that  bind  the  nations  together  by 
a  thousand  ties ;  it  is  tlic  business  of  the  fisherman  on  the  deck  of  his 
nigh  night-foundered   skiff;   of  the  minister  of  the  gospel,  and  of  all 

Sood  men  ;  of  the  widowed  mother  with  her  sailor  child,  the  only  son  of 
is  mother,  and  she  a  widow,  the  stay  and  staff  of  her  declining  age, 
whom  the  stern  call  of  a  country  in  arms  may  summon  to  the  deck  on 
which  his  father  had  fallen ;  it  is  their  business !  and  if  we  deal  fairly 
and  frankly  with  them,  excellently  well  will  they  perform  it ! 

Nevertheless,  sir,  it  must  be  admitted  that  Senators  tell  us  enough  to 
enable  us  to  interpret  the  whole  language  which  the  notice  speaks  to 
Great  Britain.  It  is  exactly  this  :  give  us  the  Oregon  by  a  treaty,  or  in  a 
year  we  will  take  it  ourselves.  For  the  honorable  Senator  informs  us 
that  it  is  to  apprize  the  British  Government  "that  we  at  last  are  in  earnest."' 
In  earnest,  indeed  !  Well,  what  may  that  mean  ?  Does  not  the  Senator 
himself  insist  upon  it,  that  we  have  been  continually  asserting  our  rights, 
by  diplomacy  and  otherwise,  for  six-and-twenty  years  ;  that  we  have  never 
slept  upon  them  an  hour;  that,  in  and  out  of  Congress,  we  have  been 
"  earnestly  agitating"  the  question,  and  "  earnestly  urging"  an  adjust- 
ment of  it  ?  When  lie  advises,  therefore,  to  a  new  measure,  which 
shall  admonish  England  that  we  ate  indeed  and  at  last  in  earnest,  he- 
means  that  it  shall  announce  something  more  than  continued  assertion 
of  title  on  paper — more  than  the  harmless  and  vain  quart  and  tierce  of 
diplomatic  conflict ;  he  means  that  it  shall  tell  her  we  have  talked' 
enough,  and  written  enough  ;  we  now  mean  to  act.  I  arrive  at  the  same- 
conclusion  by  an  analysis  of  other  portions  of .  the  Senator's  argument. 
Great  Britain,  he  says,  will  make  no  treaty  while  she  retains  /ossession- 
and  enjoyment,  as  now  she  does,  of  all  she  wants.     She  has  the  whole 


Si 


country 
her  case 
longer 
atatw  n 
if  she  d 
clear,  a 
not  hav 
Then 
us  what 
we  will 
Now 
fluencii 
vance 
may  ad 
to  be  g 
I  loeopa 
know  V 
and  his 
clumsil 
thorefo 
pated  ( 
delicac 
two  na 
regret 
precioi 
our  mc 
this  vii 
sugges 
worK  « 
sible  0 
vised, 
negoti 
thinks 
ish  m 
the  pc 
him. 
in  thi 
nerve 
usefo 
lativt 
minit 
Di 
Sena 

isgi' 
vent 
twel 
ofO 
havi 
nO'^l 
tion 


*h«t  part, 
in  of  (bis. 
)e  who  in- 
eir  handt,- 
if  dealing, 
ge  in  your 
a  pending 
irts.  many 


or  in  a 


9 

[country  now ;  and  what  more  shouhi  she  desire,  and  how  can  she  improve 
her  case  by  a  tieaty  }  We  must  tell  her,  (hen,  he  urges,  that  she  shall  no 
longer  continue  to  have  all  or  any  thing  (hat  she  desires  ;  that  the  existing 
status  must  and  shall  be  displaced  ;  (hat  the  possession  is  to  change  hands, 
if  she  does  not  (rca(  in  a  (welvemonlh.  Cer(ainly,  (his  is  reasonably 
clear,  after  nil ;  and  I  wonder  only,  that  what  is  so  palpably  meant  should 
not  have  been  more  dirccdy  said. 

Then,  sir,  (he  proposKion  is,  (o  indiico  an  unwilling  Government  to  give 
us  what  we  seek,  by  notice  publicly  communicated,  that  if  it  is  not  given 
we  will  take  it. 

Now,  sir,  on  one  point  we  shall  all  agree  ;  and  .<.  '<',  that  this  moile  of  in- 
fluencing (he  diplomacy  of  a  foreign  Governmeni,  jy  announcing  in  ad- 
vance wnat  shall  be  (he  consequences  of  certi '  >  .1e(erminations  which  it 
may  adopt,  is  a  thing  to  be  pretty  dciicatelj  handled,  it  is  a  piescription 
to  be  given  in  minute  quantities,  very  ;  inuto  quantities  indeed.  Ho- 
I  icEopalhic  doses  1  think  they  should  be.  The  p&tieni  should  scarcely 
know  what  he  takes ;  and  the  matter  should  bo  altogether  between  him 
and  his  confidential  physician.  Skilfully  administeied,  it  may  do  good  ; 
clumsilji  done,  it  is  many  thousand  times  worse  than  nothing.  I  said, 
thi?refore,  on  a  former  occasion  that,  since  this  matter  of  intimating  antici- 
pated consequences  to  a  Government  you  treat  with,  is  one  of  so  muciv 
delicacy';  since  u  blunder  in  regard  to  it  might  produce  reMilts  which 
two  nations,  which  the  world,  might  have  cause  long  and  unavailingly  to 
regret ;  since  we  hold  in  our  hands,  not  sticks  and  straws,  nor  yet  more 
precious  yet  perishable  things,  as  silver  and  gold,  but  the  lives  of  men — 
our  more  than  material  interests,  our  glory,  our  history;  I  thought  thnt,  in 
this  view,  good  sense  and  prudence  prescribed  that  we  should  leave  this- 
suggetition  of  consequences  to  be  employed  in  some  way  in  which  it  might 
worlc  all  the  good  ot  which  it  is  intrinsically  capable,  with  as  little  as  pos- 
sible of  the  evil  from  which  it  can  scarcely  be  kept  wholly  free.  I  ad- 
vised, therefore,  and  now  advise,  that  it  be  all  in(rus(ed  to  the  American 
negotiator,  the  Secretary  of  State.  Let  him  deal  with  it.  Let  him,  ii  he 
thinks  fit,  according  to  (he  courtesies  of  a  firm  diplomacy,  enable  the  Brit- 
ish minister  to  see  the  whole  ground  before  him.  Sir,  we  know  from 
the  papers  of  this  morning  who  is  the  American  Secretary.  We  know 
him.  I  am  willing  to  commit  this  matter,  and  all  else  which  is  involved 
in  this  negotiation  of  Oregon,  to  tha(  rapid  and  decisive  in(ellect,  that  iron 
nerve,  and  energetic  will,  in  his  hands,  this  delicate  suggestion  may  be 
usefully  administered.  In  ours,  published  as  it  is  proposed  to  be  by  legis- 
lative resolution  to  the  world  ;  discharged  as  from  a  battery  upon  tlie  new 
minister  as  he  comes  ashore,  how  can  it  fail  to  be  wholly  mischievous  ? 

Disregarding  al!  such  sublunary  considerations  as  these,  the  honorable 
Senator  from  Pennsylvania  thinks  it  of  no  importance  how  this  medicine 
is  given  ;  for  England,  says  he,  has  no  right  to  complain ;  the  very  Con- 
vention itself  reserves  the  power  to  either  party  to  annul  it  at  will  upon  » 
twelvemonths'  notice  ;  and  she  has  no  right  or  title  at  all  to  the  country 
of  Oregon.  Why  should  she  complain,  then,  of  our  giving  a  notice  we 
have  a  right  to  give,  and  of  our  driving  her  from  a  place  where  she  ha» 
no  right  to  be  ?  Nay,  he  seemed  to  think,  that  when  I  intimated  a  sugges- 
tion that  the  proceeding  might,  by  giving  offence,  destroy  one  chance. 


r--' 


10 

were  it  but  one  in  ten  thousand  of  our  chances  for  a  treaty,  I  manifested 
something  like  a  sensitiveness  for  English  honor  and  for  the  sake  of  Eng- 
land. 

Now,  sir,  all  this  is  well  enough  for  the  smartness  of  debate  ;  but  it 
does  not  touch,  nor  begin  to  touch,  the  difficulty.  The  question  is  not 
whether  Great  Britain  deserves  to  be  threatened,  or  deserves  to  be  whip- 
ped, but  whether  the  menace  or  the  fulfilment  will  or  will  not  diminish 
your  chances  of  obtaining  a  treaty  ?  It  is  a  treaty  which  you  say  you  de- 
sire. It  is  a  treaty  which  the  Senator  from  Pennsylvania  desires.  It  is  a 
treaty  he  is  prescribing  for.  With  this  in  view,  is  it  wise  or  foolish  to  be- 
gin by  putting  the  other  party  into  a  passion  ?  Whether,  would  you  ra- 
ther treat  with  a  good  natured  or  an  angry  Government  ?  You  say  the 
former,  of  course.  Well,  is  not  an  unreasonable  passion  as  bad  to  treat 
with  as  a  reasonable  one  }  Will  not  a  threat,  felt  to  be  deserved,  or  ac- 
tually deserved,  place  the  threatened  party  in  as  unpropitious  a  mood  and 
situation  for  sweet  tempered,  courteous,  and  rational  diplomacy,  as  a 
threat  wholly- undeserved  ?  What  is  the  operation  of  all  menace .'  Why, 
it  puts  the  object  of  it  in  a  condition  in  which  he  cannot  do  what  he  would, 
and  what  he  feels  to  be  right,  lest  he  be  subjected  to  the  imputation  of 
acting  from  fear.  The  justice  or  injustice  of  the  menace  itself  does  not 
help  or  hurt  the  matter. 

It  is  of  no  sort  of  consequence,  therefore,  whether  Great  Britain  has  a 
right  to  take  offence  or  not.  I  mean  that  it  is  of  no  consequence  to  your 
objects  and  your  interests.  It  is  of  you,  not  of  her,  that  I  am  thinking  ;  it 
it  for  you,  for  our  constituents,  for  our  country,  for  our  peace,  our  honor, 
our  fortunes,  I  am  anxious,  not  hers ;  and  it  is  that  you  may  acquire  what 
you  seek  and  w-hat  you  deserve,  that  I  counsel  you  not  to  lessen  your 
chances  of  a  treaty  by  a  menace — no,  nor  by  any  act  or  declaration  which 
may  by  reasonable  possibility  be  so  interpreted.  I  hope  I  may  caution  my 
child  not  to  rouse  with  his  little  whip  a  sleeping  irritable  animal,  without 
being  told  that  I  care  much  about  the  dog,  and  little  about  my  son.  For 
your  own  objects,  with  a  prudent  and  useful  selfishness,  avoid  the  appear- 
ance of  this  thing.  * 

Sir,  we  must  distinguish.  If  any  t>ther  conceivable  purpose  was  ex- 
pected to  be  served  by  this  notice,  than  that  of  inducing  Great  Britain  to 
give  us  a  treaty,  you  would  not  so  much  regard  its  possible  effect  on  her 
temper.  You  might  give  the  notice  for  its  other  objects,  and  for  its  other 
operation  ;  and  you  might  say  that  you  would  not  presume,  or,  in  consi- 
deration of  other  benefits,  that  you  could  afford  to  disregard,  unreasonable 
ill  nature.  But  vou  observe,  that  the  honorable  Senator  from  Pennsylva- 
nia urges  the  notice  as  a  mode,  and  an  indispensable  mode,  of  getting  a 
treaty.  This  is  exactly  and  all  the  good  it  is  to  do.  If  it  will  not  do 
that,  if  it  is  not  certain  that  it  will  do  that,  if  it  may  do  more  harm  than 
good  in  that  precise  regard  ;  if,  reasonably  or  not,  it  may  by  possibility  be 
misinterpreted,  then,  on  the  very  principles  upon  which  it  is  proposed,  you 
will  refuse  to  burn  your  fingers  with  it. 

But  the  honorable  Senator  agrees  that  we  should  not  menace.  If  this 
may  probably  and  not  wholly  unreasonably  be  taken  as  a  menace,  then  Ha 
agrees  it  is  not  to  be  given:  Well,  is  it  not  one  ?  Is  it  not  certain  that  it 
would  be  80  taken  ? 


Sir,  the  Icai 

Iber  a  reading 

|ber,at  the  exti 

as  it  was  calle 

j  a  New  YorkJ 

that  as  it  may, 

,  already  stated 

^i  Government 

I  most  deliberal 

"I  must  ensue  fr( 

I      This,  sir,  v 

i  speaking  to  ui 

'  Minister  to  a 

that  debate,  t 

to  shadow  ou 

popular  outbr 

obey.     Not  s 

What  conseq 

ish    '^arliame 

corresponden 

,    ture  of  the  ( 

And  here  let 

with  a  friend 

Una,  (Mr.  ?R 

My  friend  coi 

time,  these  w 

you  to  consid 

fusal.     Certa 

say  not  an  in 

such  languag 

any  reparatic 

Now,  sir. 

Great  Britai 

territory  fro 

claims ;  she 

I  deal  of  dipli 

\,  said  have  be 

|;  shifting,  anoi 

I  by  British  s 

gether,  by  F 

of  our  minisi 

jtiean  to  cole 

jects,  they  v 

In  this  sta 

ment  propofi 

wrong,  we  s 

munications 

rnioister  an 

assures  us ; 

portance  to 

disquiet,  thJ 


qVPlFT^Vim 


mm 


^^ 


I 


11 


Sir,  the  learning  of  threats  is  not  recondite  nor  difficult.  I  well  remem- 
ber a  reading  on  the  title,  by  the  honorable  Senator  himself,  in  (his  cham- 
ber,at  the  extra  session  of  1841.  It  was  in  the  debate  on  the  Mcl^eod  case, 
as  it  was  called.  The  British  minister  had  demanded  (hat  per^n,  then  in 
a  New  York  jail,  to  be  given  up  ;  and  he  did  it  in  these  terms  :  "  But  be 
that  as  it  may,  Her  Majesty's  Government  formally  demand,  on  the  grounds 
already  stated,  the  immediate  release  of  Mr.  McLeoil ;  and  Her  Majesty's 
Government  entreat  the  President  of  the  United  States  to  take  into  his 
most  deliberate  consideration  the  serious  nature  of  the  consequences  which 
must  ensue  from  a  rejection  of  this  demand." 

This,  sir,  was  not  the  language  of  the  Parliament  of  Great  Britain, 
speaking  to  us  in  the  hearing  of  the  whole  world.  It  was  a  letter  from  a 
'  Minister  to  a  Secretary ;  and  it  was  thought,  by  some  who  participated  in 
that  debate,  that  it  spoke  apprehension  more  than  menace ;  that  it  meant 
to  shadow  out  beforehand  a  possible,  uncontrollable,  and  unmanageable 
popular  outbreak,  of  Whig,  Radical,  and  Tory,  which  Government  must 
obey.  Not  so  the  honorable  Senator.  He  said  :  "  What  consequences  ? 
fVhat  consequences  ?  After  the  denunciations  wc  had  heard  in  the  Brit- 
ish 'Parliament,  and  all  that  had  occurred  in  the  course  of  the  previous 
correspondence,  could  any  thing  have  been  intended  but  the  serious  na- 
ture  of  the  consequences  which  must  ensue  from  war  with  England.' 
And  here  let  roe  put  a  case.  I  am  so  unfortunate  as  to  have  a  difference 
with  a  friend  of  mine.  I  will  suppose  it  to  be  my  friend  from  South  Caro- 
lina, (  Mr.  Preston.  )  I  know,  if  you  please,  even  that  I  am  in  the  wrong. 
My  friend  comes  to  me  and  deojands  an  explanation,  adding,  at  the  siime 
time,  these  words  :  If  you  do  not  grant  the  reparation  demanded,  I  entreat 
you  to  consider  the  serious  consequences  which  must  ensue  from  your  re- 
fusal. Certain  I  am  there  is  not  a  single  member  of  this  Senate,  I  might 
say  not  an  intelligent  man  in  the  civilized  world,  who  would  not  consider 
such  language  as  a  menace,  which  must  be  withdrawn  or  explained  before 
any  reparation  could  be  made." 

Now,  sir,  try  this  case  by  such  a  standard  and  such  an  illustration. 
Great  Britain  claims  a  right  to  the  joint  and  common  occupation  of  the 
territory  from  42°  to  54°  40'.  She  is  wholly  in  the  wrong ;  yet  she 
claims ;  she  has  recorded  and  urged  her  claim ;  we  have  had  a  great 
deal  of  diplomatic  conversation  about  the  matter ;  liifferent  lines  it  is 
said  have  been  proposed,  formally  or  info  'ly ;  there  is  a  sort  of  mixed, 
shifting,  anomalous  possession,  here  for  hunting,  there  for  farming ;  here 
by  British  subjects,  there  by  American  ;  and  elsewhere,  or  mingled  to- 
gether, by  French,  half-breeds,  and  Indians.  To  some  intimation  or  other 
of  our  ministers  in  1827  the  British  Government  declated  that  it  did  not 
mean  to  colonize  ;  but  that  if  a  forcible  effort  were  made  to  expel  her  sub- 
jects, they  would  be  defended. 

In  this  state  of  things  precisely,  we  by  the  Executive  organ  of  Govern- 
ment propose  to  Great  Britain  to  settle  the  whole  by  treaty.  You  are  all 
wrong,  we  said,  but  let  us  treat.  Great  Britain  agrees  to  it.  Informal  com- 
munications pass  and  repass  for  a  year  or  two  ;  and  at  length  a  British 
rninister  arrives ;  not  a  special  minister,  the  Senator  from  Pennsylvania 
assures  us  ;  a  general  minister,  but  with  no  othei  subject  whatever  of  im- 
portance to  attend  to  than  this.  This  alone  of  our  British  elements  of 
disquiet,  this  alone,  or  this  mainly,  is  left. 


12 

The  negotiation  is  ready  to  begin.  And  let  me  say  (hat  alt  this  lias 
proceeded  thus  far,  with  the  fullest  knowledge,  and  the  most  entire  virtual 
acquiescent  of  the  National  Legislature.  You  knew  at  the  last  session, 
you  have  known  from  the  first  day  of  this,  perfectly  well,  that  the  Gov- 
ernments were  negotiating  on  this  subject.  The  President  told  us  so. 
The  chairman  of  the  Comuiittee  on  Foreign  Affairs  told  you  so.  Yet  you 
did  not  interpose.  You  passed  no  resolution  forbidding  negotiation,  or 
sketching  its  course,  or  embodying  an  ultimatum.  You  have  drawn  no 
red  lines  or  black  lines,  within  or  without  which  diplomacy  shall  not  come. 
You  have  virtually  consented  that  the  whole  subject  of  controversy  be 
treated  on,  reserving  yourselves  to  your  great  constitutional  duty  of  rati- 
fying or  refusing  to  ratify  what  negotiation  shall  propose  to  you.  But 
to  negotiation  you,  the  Legislature  and  the  Executive,  agree.  To  this  the 
Senator  from  Pennsylvania  agrees. 

Well,  the  negotiators  are  taking  their  seats  at  table  ;  the  maps  are  un- 
rolled ;  (I  hope  there  are  no  red  lines  this  time,  traced  by  king  or  sage  ;) 
the  publicists  are  doubled  down  in  dogs  ears,  and  all  is  ready.  In  this 
precise  state  of  things,  the  Legislature,  which  in  matters  of  pending  and 
legitimate  negotiation  has  no  more  to  do  than  the  army  or  navy,  puts  its 
head  out  of  the  window,  and,  in  a  voice  audible  all  over  the  world,  ejacu- 
lates, *'  God-speed  your  labors  messielirs  negotiators  ;'treat  away  ;  we  are 
all  for  a  treaty  ;  we  are  deeply  anxious  to  have  a  treaty  ;  we  are  pining 
for  peace  ;  but  hark  ye,  of  the  British  side  of  that  tabic  ;  if  you  do  not 
give  us  the  whole  subject  in  dispute,  or  just  as  much  of  it  as  we  desire  to 
have,  we  mean  to  take  it  by  force  and  main  strength,  in  twelve  months 
from  this  day."  I  say,  sir,  that  looking  to  time,  place,  circumstance,  to 
the  explanatory  speeches  and  the  whole  case,  this  is  the  language.  And 
I  say,  further,  it  is  menace  ;  and  nothing  but  my  sincere  respect  and  regard 
for  Senators  who  propose  and  urge  it  prevents  my  saying,  still  further,  that 
it  is  the  most  indecent,  indecorous,  unintelligible  proceeding  the  world  of 
civilization  ever  witnessed. 

The  honorable  Senator  from  Pennsylvania  in  the  course  of  his  able  and 
plausible  speech  pressed  me  with  some  inconsistencies  of  my  argument, 
as  he  thought  them.  Certainly,  as  he  construed  and  collated  the  arguments, 
they  wore  a  look  of  inconsistency ;  and  I  felt,  and  feel,  that  they  will  re- 
quire, before  I  have  done,  some  effort  to  reconcile  them.  In  the  mean  time, 
will  he  allow  me  in  turn  to  ask  him  whether  he  and  his  friends  have  not 
fallen,  in  the  warmth  doubtless  of  discussion,  into  some  pretty  remarkable 
inconsistencies  themselves  ?  Sir,  I  have  been  exceedingly  struck  while 
listening  to  gentlemen,  and  particularly  so  perhaps  while  listening  to  the 
Senator  from  Pennsylvania,  with  the  fact,  that  while  the  ends  and  objects 
at  which  they  aim  are  all  so  pacific,  their  speeches  are  strown  and  sown 
thick,  broadcast,  with  so  much  of  (he  food  and  nourishment  of  war.  Their 
ends  and  objects  are  peace  ;  a  treaty  of  peace  ;  but  their  means  and  their 
topics  wear  a  certain  incongruous  grimness  of  aspect.  The  "  bloom  is  on 
the  rye  ;"  but  as  you  go  near,  you  see  bayonet  points  sparkling  beneath ; 
and  are  fired  upon  by  a  thousand  men  in  ambush  !  The  end  they  aim  at  is 
peace  ;  but  the  means  of  attaining  it  are  an  offensive  and  absurd  threat. 
Their  ends  and  their  objects  are  peace  ;  yet  how  full  have  they  stuffed  the 
speeches  we  have  been  hearing  with  every  single  topic  the  best  calculat- 


A  to  blo\ 
The  hoiH 
proud,  pc 
red  line 
on  with 
of  title ; 
our  fault 
ther,  by 
i-  have  hap 
;•  for  peac< 
i  him,  a  lil 
;j   calculate 
1.  cial  com 
I  theQue< 
I  masses  a 
-A      1  decl 
}  triotism 
/    they^hal 
^    in  the  s 

him." 
\  He  woi 
I  people's 
f  admirec 
turns  ag 
and  put 
of  the  ( 
steel  of 
legacy  t 
friend,  i 
mob  br( 


13 


t  all  this  W 
intire  virtual 

last  session, 

lat  the  GoF- 
told  us  so. 
so.  Yet  you 
gotiatioD,  or 
'e  drawn  no 

1  not  come, 
ntroversy  be 
duty  of  rati- 
you.     But 

To  this  the 

naps  are  un- 

ngor  sage;) 

idy.     In  this 

pending  and 

avy,  puts  its 

vorld,  ejacu- 

v^y ;  we  are 

'  are  pining 

'  you  do  not 

we  desire  to 

ttlve  months 

imstance,  to 

wage.     And 

t  and  regard 

further,  that 

the  world  of 

his  able  and 
V  argument, 
'  arguments, 
hey  will  re- 
mean  time, 
is  have  not 
remarkable 
truck  while 
!ning  to  the 
and  objects 
1  and  sown 
»ar.   Their 
9  and  their 
bloom  is  on 
g  beneath; 
ey  aim  at  is 
lurd  threat, 
stuffed  the 
St  calculat- 


ed to  blow  up  the  pa&sions  of  kindred  races  to  the  fever  heat  of  battle  ! 
The  honorable  Senator  from  Pennsylvania  is  for  peace,  but  England  is 
I  proud,  powerful  and  greedy ;  England  sends  Lord  Ashburton  here  with  a 
red  line  in  his  pocket,  and  a  white  lie  in  liis  mouth ;  England  is  pressing 
on  with  giant  tread  to  the  occupation  of  Oregon,  in  which  she  has  no  color 
of  title ;  the  English  press,  high  and  low,  is  vilifying,  day  and  night,  not 
our  faults  or  vices,  but  all  that  wc  love  and  all  that  we  honor !  Nay,  fur- 
ther, by  a  most  unhappy  and  remarkable  mere  lapse  of  tongue  it  must 
have  happened,  for  the  honorable  Senator  never  forgets  to  say  that  he  is 
for  peace,  he  tells  us,  that  while  our  cities  love  England,  as  1  understand 
him,  a  little  too  much,  "  not  wisely,  but  too  well" — (a  remark  by  the  way, 
calculated,  not  intended^  to  destroy  altogether  the  influence  of  the  commer- 
cial community  on  a  question  of  peace  or  war) — so  well  as  to  have  toasted 
the  Queen  and  insulted  the  President — the  great  unsophisticated  and  honest 
masses  already  hate  England  with  a  precious  and  ancient  enmity. 

I  declare,  sir,  that  while  listening  to  Senators  whose  sincerity  and  pa- 
triotism I  cannot  doubt,  and  to  this  conflict  of  topics  and  objects  with  which 
they  half  bewilder  mc,  I  was  forcibly  reminded  of  that  consummate  oration 
in  the  streets  of  Rome,  by  one  who  "  came  to  bury  Ca:s^r,  not  to  praise 
him."  He  did  not  wish  (o  stir  up  any  body  to  mutiny  and  rage — O,  no  ! 
He  would  not  have  a  finger  lifted  against  the  murderers  of  his  and  *'as 
people's  friend — not  he  !  Ho  feared  he  wronged  them — yet  who  haf  not 
admired  the  exquisite  address  and  the  irresistible  eflcct  with  which  he  >?• 
turns  again  and  again  to  "  sweet  Cicsar's  wounds,  poor,  poor  dumb  mouths," 
and  puts  a  tongue  in  each  ;  to  the  familiar  mantle,  first  worn  on  the  evening 
of  the  day  his  great  friend  overcame  the  Neivii,  now  pierced  by  the  cursed 
steel  of  Cassius,  of  the  envious  Oasca,  of  the  well-beloved  Brutus ;  to  his 
legacy  of  drachmas,  arbors,  and  orchards,  to  the  people  of  Rome,  whose 
friend,  whose  benefactor,  he  shows  to  them,  all  marred  by  traitors — till  ihe 
mob  break  away  from  his  words  of  more  than  fire,  with — 

"  Wc  will  be  revenged  : — revenge :   about ! 

Seek — burn — fire — kill — slay  ! — let  not  a  traitor  live." 

Anthony  was  insincere  :  Senators  are  wholly  sincere  ;  yet  the  contrast 
between  their  pacific  professions  and  that  revelry  of  belligerent  topics  and 
sentiments  which  rings  and  flashes  in  their  speeches  here,  half  suggests  a 
doubt  to  me,  sometimes,  whether  they  or  I  perfectly  know  what  they  mean 
or  what  they  desire.  They  promise  to  show  you  a  garden,  and  you  look 
up  to  see  nothing  but  a  wall,  "  with  dreadful  faces  thronged,  and  fieiy  arms !" 
They  propose  to  teach  you  hov  peace  is  to  be  preserved ;  and  they  do  it 
so  exquisitely  that  you  go  away  lalf  inclined  to  issue  letters  of  marque  and 
reprisal  to-morrow  morning. 

The  argument  runs  somewhat  thus,  ( I  do  not  pretend  to  use  the  exact 
words  of  any  one  : )  "  We  are  for  peace — but  flesh  and  blood  can't  stand 
every  thing ;  wc  are  wholly  for  peace — but  our  emotions  almost  choke  us  to 
death  when  wc  think  of  their  sending  Lord  Ashburton  here  with  bis  Aup^ 
pressio  vert,  and  allegatio  falsi ;  we  are  for  peace  by  all  manner  of 
means — yet  see  England  laying  her  mortmain  and  dishonest  grasp  on  the 
Oregon,  as  she  had  before  on  the  highland  passes  of  Maine,  enfolding 
both  to  her  rapacious  breast — and  bear  it  who  can  !  we  want  peace — but 
hear  that  ribald  and  all-libelling  press,  that  spares  neither  age,  nor  sex, 


'7 


14 

nor  the  secrets  of  the  grare !  we  want  peace — not  that  we  lore  England 
quite  so  much  as  the  cities,  whose  treasures  indeed,  and  whose  interests, 
we  hope  not  all  their  affections,  are  more  abroad  than  at  home  ;  we  would 
have  the  Executive  dispositions,  if  we  cculd,  as  sweet  and  peace-making 
as  our  own — but  impartiality  obliges  us  to  remind  him  where,  when,  and 
how,  his  health  was  not  drunk,  and  the  Queen's  was !  we,  public  men, 
are  all  for  peace ;  but  how  long  we  shall  be  able  to  rein  in  the  great  body 
of  the  people,  stung  and  maddened  by  the  memory  of  so  many  wrongs, 
Heaven  only  knows."  So  runs  the  argument.  The  proposition  is  peace ; 
hut  the  audience  rises  and  goes  off  with  a  sort  of  bewildered  and  unpleas- 
ing  sensafion,  that  if  there  were  a  thousand  men  in  all  America  ss  well 
disposed  as  the  orator,  peace  might  be  preserved  ;  but  that,  as  the  case 
stands,  it  is  just  about  hopeless  !  I  ascribe  it  altogether  to  their  anxious 
and  tender  concern  for  peace,  that  Senators  have  not  a  word  to  say  about  the 
good  she  does,  but  only  about  the  dangers  she  is  in.  They  have  the  love 
of  compassion  ;  not  the  love  of  desire.  Not  a  word  about  the  countless 
blessings  she  scatters  from  her  golden  urn  ;  but  only  "  the  pity  of  it,  lago ! 
the  pity  of  it !"  to  think  how  soon  the  dissonant  clangor  of  a  thousand 
brazen  throats  may  chase  that  bloom  from  her  cheek, 

"And  (Icnth's  pale  flag  be  quick  advanced  there." 

Sir,  no  one  here  can  say  one  thing,  and  mean  another ;  yet  r.uch  may  be 
meant,  and  nothing  directly  said. 

'     "The  dial  spoke  not,  but  pointed'full  upon  the  stioke  of  murder." 

Let  me  advert  now,  sir,  to  the  manner  in  which  another  topic,  on  which 
1  said  something  before,  has  been  dealt  with  by  the  honorable  Senator.  I 
suggested,  that  if  you  decide  to  give  this  notice,  the  Committee  on  Foreign 
Relations  ought  at  once  to  be  directed  to  inquire  whether  any  and  what 
measures  are  necessary  now  to  be  adopted  in  view  of  the  expected  an- 
nulment of  the  Convention.  And  my  reason  was,  that  if,  unhappily,  we 
should  not  have  a  treaty  within  the  year,  at  the  end  of  the  year  our  claims 
and  those  of  the  British  Government  must  come  into  direct  and  forcible 
collision  on  the  contested  territory.  The  grounds  of  that  apprehension  I 
had  the  honor  quite  in  detail  to  lay  before  you. 

Well,  what  has  been  the  answer  to  this }  Why,  O  !  never  ftar ;  we 
shall  certainly  have  a  treaty.  Beyond  that  single  and  satisfactory  ejacu- 
lation no  one  goes  an  inch. 

Now,  Mr.  President,  this  is  very  well.  But  as  no  gentleman  k  ^ 
that  we  shall  have  a  treaty,  I  press  my  original  question  :  what  is  to  come 
to  pass,  where  are  we  to  be,  what  are  we  to  do  at  the  end  of  a  year, 
iirith  the  Convention  annulled  and  no  treaty  concluded  ?  What  is  the 
theory  of  Senators  upon  such  an  hypothesis  ?  Surely,  it  is  no  answer  at 
all  to  say  we  shall  have  a  treaty.  We  know  nothing  at  all  about  it;  we 
do  not  know,  we  cannot  guess,  whether  we  shall  or  shall  not.  Since, 
then,  you  would  have  us  assume  the  responsibility  of  our  deserting  our  Bet- 
tied  and  approved  policy  in  this  behalf,  since  you  propose  that  at  the  end 
of  a  year  the  Convention  which  has  kept  the  peace  of  the  countries  and 
slowly  developed  the  probable  destinies  of  Oregon  for  twenty-six  years, 
shall  cease  to  exist,  are  you  not  bound  to  survey  the  matter  on  all  sides, 
and  therefore  to  answer  this  question — where  is  Oregon,  and  where  are 


I  the  coun 

no  treat; 

Sir,  it 

unaccom 

tice  is  a 

take  it. 

does  not 

concern 

game,  s 

Northea 

will  opp 

hers,  yo 

not  ver 

loftily  si 

the  sett 

by  theii 

will  del 

signed 

Itho 

quence 

er  Orej 

on  the 

and  wh 

Is  then 

notice  i 

which 

concen 

talons, 

Willy 

then, i 

and  thi 

shattei 

Yet 

proud 

energj 

withoi 

the  w: 

tricks, 

the  I> 

solitai 

give  ^ 

tiee  sc 

pen  t( 

Sir 

this  11 


16 


j  the  countries,  when  (hat  state  of  things  arrives  and  brings,  as  it  may  bring, 
no  treaty  ? 

Sir,  it  did  and  does  seem  to  me,  that  the  annulment  of  the  Convention, 
unaccompanied  by  treaty,  places  the  Governments  in  collision.  Your  no- 
tice is  a  declaration  that  in  a  year,  if  the  country  is  not  yielded,  you  will- 
take  it.  Great  Britain  has  recorded  her  declaration,  that  although  she 
does  not  propose  to  colonize,  and  although,  as  I  gather,  she  would  not 
concern  herself  in  it,  if  the  Hudson's  Bay  Company,  the  hunter,  and  the 
game,  should  slowly  retire  to  the  more  congenial  deserts  of  the  North  and 
Northeast,  yet,  that  iC  you  forcibly  attempt  to  dispossess  them  now,  she 
will  oppose  force  to  force.  If  you  execute  your  threat,  and  she  executes 
hers,  you  certainly  are  in  collision.  If  you  do  not, you  will  have  to  retire 
not  very  magnificently  from  a  position  up  to  which  you  will  have  very 
loftily  strutted.  Besides,  if  the  Convention  is  abrogated,  collisions  among 
the  settlers,  each  body  of  them  feeling  that  they  represent  and  are  backed 
by  their  own  Government,  will  become  inevitable ;  each  Government 
will  defend  its  own  ;  and  there  is  a  war  iu  the  Oregon,  whether  you  de- 
signed it  or  not. 

I  thought  therefore,  and  now  do,  that  in  this  view  of  possible  conse- 
quences, it  is  not  (00  soon,  if  the  notice  is  given,  to  begin  to  inquire  wheth- 
er Oregon  is  to  be  defended  in  Oregon,  or  under  the  walls  of  Quebec,  or 
on  the  sea;  and  if  in  the  Oregon,  how  it  is  to  be  done  ;  by  what  floating 
and  what  stationary  force  ;  at  what  cost ;  and  on  what  ways  and  means  ? 
Is  there  a  doubt  that  England  would  begin  to  prepare  on  the  day  of  the 
notice  ?  With  her  habits,  with  her  means,  under  the  apprehensions 
which  the  notice  would  excite,  would  she  not  begin  to  accumulate  and 
concentrate  a  preparation  which  would  enable  her  (o  s(oop,  beak  and 
talons,  upon  the  con(e8(ed  (erri(ory,  on  the  day  (hat  the  year  should  expire  ? 
Will  you  &it  still,  and  see  and  hear  her  preparing  ?  To  give  this  notice, 
then,  and  go  hoir.e  without  more,  were  to  light  a  train  to  the  magazine, 
and  then  lie  down  to  sleep  upon  the  deck,  which  in  half  a  niinute  will  be 
shattered  to  atoms. 

Yet  Senators  are  so  sure  of  having  a  treaty,  they  are  so  sure  that  this 
proud  and  grasping  Power,  this  Power  which  "  pushes  her  rights  with 
energy  while  we  sleep  on  ours,"  this  Power  which  will  not  treat  at  all 
without  a  menace,  will  treat  under  menace ;  that  she  will  sweetly  yield 
the  whole  matter  in  dispute  in  a  year  ;  that  red  lines,  courtly  diplomatic 
tricks,  the  avarice  of  territory,  the  dreams  of  Gibraltars  and  Maltas  on 
the  Northwest  coast,  the  pride  of  protecting  all  her  subjects  from  what 
solitary  spot  of  land  or  sea  soever  their  cries  assail  the  throne — will  all 
give  way  ;  so  sure  arc  they  of  all  this,  that  they  will  not  have  a  commit- 
tiee  so  much  as  inquire  what  is  to  be  done  if  none  of  these  fine  things  hap- 
pen to  come  to  pass ! 

Sir,  my  friends  and  myself  are  willing  to  go  before  the  country  upon 
this  matter.  We  oppose  the  notice ;  but  if  you  give  it,  then,  we  say,  pre- 
pare with  a  rational  forecast  for  the  consequences.  Senators  on  the  other 
side  advise  the  notice,  and  resist  even  inquiry  into  the  expediency  of  any 
preparation  at  all. 

I  eome  at  last,  sir,  to  that  part  of  my  previous  observations  on  which 
the  Senator  from  Pennsylvania  has  chiefly  diffused  himself. 


16 


I  said,  for  the  purpose  of  persuading  you  not  to  give  this  notice  now, 
(for  that  all  along  is  the  whole  subject  of  deliberation — shall  it  be  givcti 
now  ?) — that  over  and  above  the  possible  inauspicious  influence  of  the  no- 
tice  upon  the  negotiation,  the  Convention  was  actually  working  very  well 
'  for  you  in  the  Oregon  itself.  I  said,  therefore,  that  so  far  from  precipitat- 
ingan  attempt  to  abrogate  it  to-day,  it  was  perhaps  nut  certain  that  you 
would  ever  do  so,  treaty  or  no  treaty.  It  would  be  very  proper,  at  least, 
I  suggested,  that  a  committee  should  inquire  what  is  the  actual  operation 
of  the  Convention  ;  and  whether  time,  the  Convention  subsisting,  did 
now,  and  would  hereafter,  "  fight  for  you  or  fi;:ht*for  England  ?"  °  I  said 
that,  in  my  view  of  the  facts,  the  actual  tendencies  of  events  were  giving 
you  the  agricultural  portions  of  Oregon  ;  and  that  there  was  nothing  now 
in  operation  in  England  or  Oregon  which  was  at  all  counteracting  those 
tendencies.  Such  was  the  actual  operation  of  the  Convention.  And  then 
I  said,  that  although  all  this  might  change  ;  although  England  or  the  Hud- 
son's Bay  Company  might  put  into  activity  some  new  agencies  of  coun- 
teraction to  keep  our  agricultural  settlers  out ;  yet  I  did  suggest,  that  if 
things  could  be  left  as  now  they  are,  to  succeed  one  another  in  their  natu- 
ral course  ;  if  time  and  chance,  as  now,  could  be  continued  in  the  control 
of  events ;  if  collision  is  not  precipitated,  and  blood  is  not  shed ;  if  ex- 
asperated and  mad  national  will,  stimulated  to  undesigned  and  unreasona- 
ble action,  is  not  substituted  for  the  natural  sequence  of  things ;  if  the 
whole  could  remain,  as  now  it  is,  intrusted  to  the  silent  operation  of  those 
great  laws  of  business  and  man,  which  govern  in  the  moral  world, as  grav- 
itation among  the  stars  ;  upon  this  hypothesis,  I  suggested  that  your  peo- 
ple would  spread  themselves  upon  the  whole  agricultural  capacities  of  Or- 
egon, and  the  Hudson's  Bay  Company,  (he  hunter,  and  the  game,  would 
retire  to  a  fitter  region  for  that  wild  pursuit.  That  this  would  be  so  I 
could  not  assert,  of  course.  Over  and  over  again,  I  said  the  British  poli- 
cy might  ta\j,e  some  new  direction.  We  may  brag  her  into  a  change  of 
it.  The  foolishness  of  debate  may  change  it.  In  point  of  fact,  however, 
now,  for  the  present,  the  Convention  works  well.  Continue  it,  therefore. 
But  keep  a  constant  and  keen  lookout  upon  the  Oregon  ;  and  in  the  mean 
time,  you  are  filling  it  with  its  appropriate  and  its  natural  defenders. 

Such,  exactly,  sir,  was  the  poetical  and  self-deceiving  policy  which  so 
much  amuses  the  honorable  Senator  from  Pennsylvania.  Has  he  adequate- 
ly met  the  view  I  took  ?     Sir,  I  think  not. 

Consider,  sir,  first,  what  is  the  exact  question.  It  is  this.  Js  the  ac- 
tual wofking  of  the  Convention  snch  as  to  afford  a  reason  for  abrogating 
it  sufficiently  clear  and  weighty  to  induce  you  to  disregard  and  take  the 
hazard  of  those  probable  inauspicious  influences  which  the  proposed  no- 
tice would  exert  upon  the  p^  ling  negotiation  ?  The  cfl'ect  of  the  no- 
tice upon  negotiation,  I  hope  I  have  shown,  would  be  bad.  The  argu- 
ment of  the  Senator  from  Pentuylvania,  that  notice  would  help  negotia- 
tion, I  hope  I  have  shown,  is  not  sound  nor  specious.  Still  the  question 
arises.  Does  the  actual  working  of  the  Convention  aflbrd  a  reason,  ifce> 
spective  of  the  efiiect  of  notice  upon  negotiation,  for  abrogating,  or  a  rea- 
son  for  continuing  it  ?  Does  it  afford  so  strong  a  reason  for  abrogating  it, 
that  you  should  ieel  obliged  to  abrogate  it  at  the  expense  of  a  treaty  ?  I  hare 
8ai(\  and  repeat,  that  on  the  contrary,  the  Convention  operates  so  favora- 


i]y,  that,  witl 

negotiation,  yi 

and  when  you 

What,  then 

dencies  and  < 

with  your  peo 

cies  and  inst 

tendencies  an 

a  pure  questic 

tion  of  the  ps 

and  by  itself. 

not  very  usefi 

the  honorable 

claim,  Englar 

Our  busine 

of  the  presen 

vention  to-da 

are  refuted, 

then  we  can 

The  first  s 

things,  was  t 

ing  the  agric 

dencies  whicl 

tiers  from  at 

something  li 

Springing  u[ 

where,  by  hii 

ing  rather, 

honest  old  A 

and  by  the 

possess,  whe 

is  growing,  s 

will  cover  tl 

cover  the  se 

otution.     A 

lostrated  thi: 

"Oregon  18  0 
'  such  were  once  I 
country — 'point 
F!ve  thouaand 
before  another  y 
you  legislate  for 
ered  in  the  Hou 

To  the  sa 
Illinois  him 

"The  peopU 
acted.  For  ma 
the  purpose  of 


poli- 


i 


17 

)ly,  that,  without  the  least  regard  tn  the  unpropitious  effect  of  notice  upon 
negotiation,  you  should  not  to-day  disturb  it.  Whether  you  ever  shall, 
and  when  you  shall,  events  will  reveal  to  you. 

What,  then,  is  the  actual  working  of  the  Convention  ?  Are  there  ten- 
dencies and  causes  now  actually  in  operation,  which  would  fill  Oregon 
with  your  people,  if  not  counteracted  ;  and  ara  there  counteracting  agen- 
cies and  instrumentalities  actually  in  operation  which  overcome  those 
tendencies  and  causes,  and  thus  keep  your  people  out  ?  And  this,  sir,  is 
a  pure  question  of  fact.  It  is  a  question  of  mere  evidence.  It  is  a  ques- 
tion of  the  past  and  the  present  of  Oregon.  Examine  it,  then,  as  such, 
and  by  itself.  Do  not  let  it  be  confounded  with  the  very  different,  and 
not  very  useful  question,  What  is  to  be  the  future  of  Oregon  .'  Let  not 
the  honorable  Senator  jump  aside  or  jump  forward  from  the  fact,  and  ex- 
claim, England  will  do  this;  the  Hudson's  Bay  Company  will  do  that! 

Our  business  is  not  to  guess  about  the  future;  but  to  discern  the  duties 
of  the  present,  and  to  fulfil  thera.  You  urge  the  abrogation  of  the  Con- 
vention to-day.  See,  then,  how  it  works  to-day.  If  it  work  well,  you 
are  refuted.  And  if  then  you  guess  it  will  work  badly  next  year,  I  say 
then  we  can  abrogate  it  next  year. 

The  first  suggestion,  sir,  which  I  made  touching  the  existing  state  of 
things,  was  that  causes  and  tendencies  now  actually  in  operation  are  GIU 
ing  the  agricultural  parts  of  Oregon  with  your  people  ;  causes  and  ten- 
dencies which,  not  counteracted,  will  fill  those  parts  wi(h  agricultural  set- 
tlers from  among  yourselves.  There  is  already  kindled  and  diffused 
something  like  a  passion  for  agricultural  emigration  to  that  country. 
Springing  up  and  spreading,  one  knows  not  how ;  not  prompted,  as  else- 
where, by  hlinger,  by  pauperism,  by  the  want  of  work  or  wages  ;  spring- 
ing rather,  perhaps,  from  a  craving  of  personal  independence,  and  an 
honest  old  Anglo-Saxon  appetite  for  land  ;  stimulated  by  our  large  liberty, 
and  by  the  feeling  that  we  have  vast  tracts  of  new  world  to  divide  and 
possess,  wherein  each  may  get  his  share :  the  passion  exists,  is  diffused, 
is  growing,  and,  in  the  absence  of  insuperable  counteracting  agencies, 
will  cover  the  whole  agricultural  opportunities  of  Oregon,  as  the  waters 
cover  the  sea.  Such,  1  ^  ^id,  was  the  view  taken  by  the  friends  of  the  res- 
olution. A  vivid  paragraph  from  a  speech  delivered  elsewhere  well  il- 
lustrated this. 

' '  Oregon  U  our  land  of  promise.     Oregon  in  our  land  of  destination.     '  The  finjjcj  of  N«tnrc' — 
surh  were  once  the  words  of  the  gentlcinnn  from  Massachusetts,   [Mr.  AnA.M.«,]  in  regard  to  thia 

country 'pointsthat  out,'     Two  thouaand  American  citizens  arc  already  indwcUcra  of  hurvalleys. 

Five  thousand  more — ay,  it  may  bo  twice  that  number — will  have  crossed  the  mountain  pamm, 
J^  before  another  year  rolls  round.     While  you  arc  legislating,  they  arc  emigrating ;  and  whether 
you  legislate  for  them  or  not,  they  will  emigrate  still." — Speech  of  Mr.  Owen,  of  Indiana,  de&a- 
ered  in  the  Home  of  Representatives  of  the  United  Slates,  January  Vidand  24M,  1844. 

To  the  same  effect  was  the  less  fervent  language  of  the   Senator  from 
Illinois  himself,  in  his  speech  upon  introducing  this  resolution. 

"  The  people  of  the  West  have  not  contented  themselves  with  expresssing  opinions — they  have 
acted.     For  many  years  our  citizens  have  gone  into  the  country  west  of  the  Rocky  Mountaiiu^  br 
Ihe  purpose  of  hunting,  trapping,  and  trading  with  the  Indians.     They  have  also  more  recently 
i 


PRO 


18 


gone  for  the  purpoM  of  making  pennuient  lettlemenU.  During  the  lait  year,  more  than  a  thott> 
sand  bravf)  and  hardy  piqneera  aet  out  from  Independence,  in  Miaiouri,  and,  overcomi^  all  ,ob- 
staelns.  hay e  arrived  safe  in  the  Oregon.  Thu«  the  firat  attempt  to  eroaathr  extenaiTe  prairies 
and  high  mountains  which  intervene  between  the  settlements  in  the  States  and  the  Pacific  ocean 
has  been  completely  successful.  The  prairie  wilderness  and  the  snowy  mountains,  which  have 
heretofore  been  deemed  impassable,  which  were  to  constitute,  in  the  opinion  of  some,  an  impene- 
trable barrier  to  the  further  progress  of  emigration  to  the  West,  ard  already  oven;ome.  The  same 
bold  and  daring  spirits,  whose  intrepidity  has  heretofore  overcome  the  Western  wilderness  in  the 
niidst  of  dangers,  can  never  be  checked  in  their  march  to  the  shores  of  the  Vadf"-  During  the 
next  summer  I  believe  thousands  will  follow.  Extensive  preparations  are  now  making  for  a  gene- 
ral move  towards  that  country.  The  complete  snccesi  of  those  who  have  first  gone  will  moouragc 
others ;  and,  as  the  road  is  now  marked  out,  I  do  not  think  1  am  at  all  extravagant  when  1  suppose 
that  ten  thousand  emigrants  will  go  to  Oregon  next  summer." 

Indeed,  I  added,  the  one  great  fact  which,  first,  last,  every  where  and 
always  strikes  you  on  a  review  of  our  history,  is  the  noiseless,  innumer- 
ous  movement  of  our  nation  westward. 

Setting  off  two  centuries  ago  from  J-imestown  and  Plymouth,  we  have 
spread  to  the  Alleganies;  we  have  topped  them;  we  have  diffused  our- 
selves over  the  imperial  valley  beyond ;  we  have  crossed  the  Father  of 
Kivers;  the  granite  and  ponderous  gates  of  the  Rocky  Mountains  have 
opened,  and  we  stand  in  sight  of  the  great  sea.  He  whose  childhood 
learned  his  mother's  tongue  from  her  loved  lips,  in  the  utmost  North  and 
East,  speaks  it  to-day  in  the  tones  of  a  man  on  the  shores  of  the  Pacific; 
speaks  it  to  teach  the  truths  and  consolations  of  religion  and  of  culture  to 
tke  wasted  native  race  ;  speaks  it  there,  and  is  still  at  home  !  unexpatri- 
ated,  unalienated,  his  "  heart,  untravelled,"  still  turning  to  you  !  In  this 
fact,  recorded  and  exemplified  by  all  our  history,  there  was  revealed  a 
law  of  growth,  which,  in  the  absence  of  counteracting  causes,  would  fill 
all  that  was  worth  filling  of  the  country  in  dispute. 

Such  was  the  first  of  the  facts  I  urged  which  make  up  the  actual  pres- 
ent of  this  question  of  Oregon. 

And,  now,  what  does  the  I.snorable  Senator  from  Pennsylvania  say  to 
this  ?  Does  he  controvert  it,  or  any  part  of  it  ?  Certainly  not.  Does  be 
doubt  the  existence  of  a  formed,  diffused  passion  for  emigrating  to  Ore- 
gon.' Not  he,  indeed  !  Does  he  doubt  the  agricultural  capacities  of  the 
country .''  I  understand  him  to  go  the  whole  length  of  his  friends,  the 
friends  of  this  resolution,  in  their  high  estimate  of  those  capacities.  Does 
he  deride  and  disbelieve  the  law  which  seems  to  conduct  our  star  of  em- 
pire wftstward  ?     O  no !     Hear  him  : 

"He  believed  that  the  system  of  law  and  of  social  order  we  enjoyed  was' destined  to  be  the  in- 
heritance of  this  continent  For  this  it  was  that  the  Almighty  had  put  within  this  entire  nation 
that  spirit  of  progreFs,  and  that  disposition  to  roam  abroad  and  seek  out  new  homes  and  new  fields 
of  enterprise.  It  could  not  be  repressed  ;  it  was  idle  to  talk  of  it ;  you  might  as  well  arrest  the  stars 
in  their  course  through  heaven.  The  same  Divine  hand  gave  impulse  to  both.  Stop  the  Amer- 
ican people  from  crossing  the  Rocky  Mountains!  You  might  as  well  command  Niagara  not  to 
flow.     We  had  a  dvtitiny ,  and  it  would  be  fulfilled," 

SiCt  how. poor,  flat,  spiritless,  prosaic,  was  all  I  said,  to  this!  He  talk 
of.;>njr!^PQ^.t''y,  indeed!    Why  compared  with  these  arrow  flights,  thefw. 


than  a  thoa» 
omijny  all  .ob> 
nwive  praiiin 
Paoiflc  ocean 
I  which  have 
ii  an  impene- 
.  The  lame 
demeas  in  the 
During  the 
ng  for  a  gone- 
Rill  mcouragc 
fhen  1  luppogc 

where  and 
innumer- 

,  we  have 
ffuaed  our- 

Father  of 
itaiDs  have 

childhood 
North  and 
he  Pacific; 

culture  to 
unexpatri- 
I !  In  this 
revealed  a 
,  would  fill 

ctual  preS' 

inia  say  to 
Does  be 
ng  to  Ore- 
ties  of  the 
lends,  the 
es.  Does 
itar  of  em- 

to  be  the  in- 
entire  nation 
nd  new  fields 
rreat  the  itars 
•p  the  Amer- 
iagannotto 


He  talk 
bts,  the^e, 


ea^le  flights,  of  the  soaring  Senator,  I  crept  upon  the  ground ;  I  abased  ' 
mysjelf ;  1  lay  flat  on  my  face ;  I  hid  my  head  in  the  humble  reeds! 

No  wonder,  indeed,  that  the  topic  inspires  him  \'ith  "thoughts  that  vol- - 
untary  move  harmonious  numbers."     Yet  it  has  its  sad  and  fearful  as- 
pects, too,  on  whtjh  we  may,  and  soon,  have  cause  to  dwell. 

Tendencies  and  causes  then  in  actual  operation  are  conducting  your 
people  to  the  occupation  of  the  whole  agricultural  Oregon.  The  next  ' 
question  is,  are  there  any  counteracting  agencies  actually  operating  to  check 
and  restrain  these  tendencies  and  causes,  and  thus  to  keep  your  people 
out  ?  Is  the  British  Government  and  nation  now  doing  any  thing,  is  the 
Hudson's  Bay  Company  now  doing  any  thing,  to  prevent  settleis  from- 
among  yourselves  taking  up  the  entire  agricultural  capacities  of  that  far 
West  ? 

Beginning,  then,  with  the  British  Government  and  nation  at  home,  as' 
distinct  from  the  Hudson's  Bay  Company,  whose  policy  requires  to  be  sep- 
arately examined,  I  said,  and  say,  that  upon  all  the  evidence  to  which  I 
have  access,  and  to  which  you  all  and  all  the  world  have  equal  access, 
there  is  no  proof  whatever  ihat  that  Government  and  nation  is  doing  any 
thing  which  operates  in  the  slightest  degree  to  keep  out  or  to  embarrass 
our  agricultural  emigration  to  Oregon.  Do  not  lose  sight  of  the  question. 
That  question  is,  What  is  the  existing  state  of  things?  What  is  that  Gov- 
ernment doing  noti;  ?  Three  years,  six  months,  the  next  packet,  may 
change  every  thing.     But  what  is  going  on  now  ? 

In  the  first  place,  then,  1  said,  and  repeat,  that  I  see  no  proof  that 
that  Government  and  nation,  or  any  party  or  association  or  individual  of 
the  British  nation  at  home,  are  now  carrying  on  the  agricultural  coloniza- 
tion of  Oregon  ;  or  do  now,  or  ever  did,  cherish  the  purpose  of  colonizing 
it,  or  any  part  of  it,  for  objects  of  agriculture. 

Some  proofs  and  considerations  having  a  tendency  to  evince  that  na 
such  thing  is  doing,  and  that  no  such  purpose  is  cherished,  were  then  ad-  •■ 
verted  to.     In  1837  Mr.  Gallatin,  in  a  letter  to  the  American  Secretary  of  ■ 
State,  observes  that  the  British  negotiators  declared  "  there  was  no  inten-  - 
tion  on  the  part  of  Great  Britain  to  colonize  the  country  (of  the  Columbia)  ■ 
or  impede  the  progress  of  American  settlement."     And  then,  through  all 
that  series  of  colonization  and  emigration  enterprise,  beginning  in  Great  ' 
Britain  in  1826,  perhaps  as  far  back  as  1815,  by  which  the  British  Gov- 
ernment under  successive  administrations,  and  by   which  associations  of  { 
private  persons,  and  by   which   wise  and   feeling  individual  minds,  have  r 
sought  to  relieve  the  over  pressure  of  population  at  home  by  opening  new 
fields  of  British  labor  and  new  markets  of  British  goods  abroad: — an  en- 
terprise which  has  excited  so  much  interest  and  caused  so  much  discus- 
sion in  Parliament  and  by  the  press.;  an  enterprise  which  has  carried  many 
hundreds  of  thousands  of  voluntary   emigrants  to  every  spot  almost  of  . 
British  earth — to  .'\ustralia,  N'  >'  Zealand,  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope,  thai 
Canada8,'New  Brunswick,  Nova  Scotia,  and  all  the  isles  of  the  sea ;  in  the  -  . 
whole  history  of  this  enterprise,  nobody  has  proposed  to  colonize  the  Ore'. 
gon,  and  nobody  has  taken  a  step  that  way.    The  neceeisily  of  colonizar. 
tion  on  the  largest. scale  has  been  admitted.     It  has  been  forced  upon  iha . 
British  public  mind.     It  is  most  energetically  and  successfully  acted  upon«v 
Colonies  are  rising  every  where;  new.  fiel,ds  and  new  shops.  ofaBrittsh. 


wm 


20 

Ul>ftr4  ne\Y  markets  of  British  manufactures;  new  investments  of  British 
capita],  benefiting  him   who  emigrates  and  him  who  stays  at  home  ;  stim- 
ulating British  production;  "putting  the  full  breast  of  youthful  exuber- 
^Bce  to  the  mouth  of  the  exhausted  parent."     Yet  no  human  being  has 
cuii^ratcd  or  meditated  emigration,  that  I  can  see,  to  the  Oregon.     The 
atiFAKtugcs  and  disadvantages  of  ail  these  seats  of  colonization  have  been 
repeatedly  and  warmly  discussed  in  Parliament,  and  by  the  whqle  press, 
liiigh  and  low,  but  not  one  word  that  I  can  find  has  been  spoken  or  written 
Wliie  Oregon.     I  referred  to  a  catalogue  of  books  coming  under  the  gen- 
«Faii  denomination  of  Emigrants' Guides,  just  published  in  London,  in  which 
the  roving  English  reader  may  find  something  to  induce  him  to  go  to  al- 
most every  other  spot  on  earth  or  sea,  and  to  show  him  the  way  to  it,  but 
<>ot  a  pufTand  not  a  direction  for  Oregon.     In  no  paper  put  forth  by  the 
'Gcveinnient,  or  any  association  of  persons  ;  in  no  speech,  in  no  book, in  no 
ae4  of  any  description,  or  of  any  body,  do  1  see  a  paiticlc  of  proof  of  the 
nt^istence  of  a  design  to  settle  that  country  for  agriculture  or  for  any  thing, 
^fvtdecil,  when  you  consider  of  how  vast  u  colonial  territory  Great  Britain 
is  (he  admitted  exclusive  proprietor  ;  a  territory  on  which  her  descend- 
-aunCs  may  go  on  for  ages  spreading  to  hundreds  of  millions  ;   a   territory 
.<aore  accessible  and  towards   which  the  current  of  emigration  is  already 
running  ;  on  which  the  foundations  of  new  States  arc  already  traced,  and 
4lw  structures  going  up,  it  is  not  strange  that  she  has   not  directed  her 
^v'andering  steps  to  tins  last  home  of  man,  where  she  does  not  pretend  to 
ovm  an  acre  by  an  exclusive  title,  and  to  which  wc  are  known  to  deny 
iHir  liny  title  at  all. 

WfiJJ,  sir,  how  does  the  Senator  meet  this .'  Why,  he  says  Great  Brit- 
^uiaimist  colonize.  "  What !  he  exclaims,  not  colonize  .-'  It  is  the  indis- 
.pensiille  condition  of  hei  existence  ;  she  wius/ colonize."  Certainly,  sii. 
Sol  ifiid  the  honor  to  say.  But  she  must  not  colonize  the  top  of  Mont 
lifaMc:;  and  she  must  not  colonize  the  dome  of  St.  Paul's  church,  that  I 
aat  aware  of.',  and  whether  she  is  colonizing  or  meditates  colonizing  the 
o^i^iicultural  parts  or  any  parts  of  Oregon  is  a  pure  and  sheer  question  of 
£i.tft,  Co  be  settled  by  the  proofs. 

fK<turning,  then,  to  the  proofs,  the  Senator  has  produced  nothing  but 
tias  renewal  of  the  Hudson's  Bay  Company's  charter,  in  which  is  reserv- 
'^vTigbtto  colonize.  It  was  my  purpose  to  have  remarked  on  this  be- 
^m^«i)d  to  urge,  as  now  I  do,  that  it  greatly  strengthens  the  position 
'  ffiMt  4he  British  Government  has  not  formed  the  purpose  of  attempting 
ji;;i;m»Uural  settlement  in  that  country.  But  the  Senator  from  Missouri, 
/ MEc.  AscHiaoy, )  to  whom  I  was  replying,  not  having  adverted  to  this  doc- 
mnwiit.  It  at  the  moment  escaped  my  attention. 

Sir,  the  fact  is  this  :  In  1837  the  company  applied  for  a  r^H^^al  of  its 

Soeane  to  trade  and  hunt.     To  obtain  it,  a  good  story 'xvas  to  be  told,  and 

tSK  Oregon,  and  all  the  other  almost  untraunded  territory  on  both  sides  of 

>tfiKll«rky  Mountains,to  which  the  license  extended,  certainly  was  describ- 

edl  in  the  color  of  the  rosev  'The  British,  Government,  haying  such  an  ac- 

•aoHntef  it  thrust  into -their  ve^ry,  faces,  determi;ied  to  ititro.duceint£(t|^e 

ctasMfPal  a  reservation  of  the  right  as  against  the  comj|»ny'  1^9 '^9^1'!^*^^ 

'.o&j  part^of'^hd  whole  count'rv  tb  which  the  licen'^b'^kt^hdedf^  'if  du'rihg 

.  -itmtMfmiiitf  yearns  lor  which  tl^ey  gate  the' r6ifi^wal   it'sHoulId  wish  to  do 


T 


21 

80.  And  thi«  ia  all.  But  does  this  afford  a  scrap  of  evidence  that  that 
Government  had  then  formed,  or  has  notv  formed,  tlie  design  of  coloniai»|{. 
the  Oregon  ? 

!n  the  first  place,  there  is  no  proof  of  any  one  act  evincing  such  a  de> 
sign.  It  was  a  Whig  administration  which  in  1838  renewed  the  liecnse^ 
That  administration  held  power  till  1841,  and  did  nothing  o>)  the  subject.^ 
The  Tory  administration  that  succeeded  it  has  done  nothing.  But  I  may 
go  further.  The  Senator  from  Indiana,  (Mr.  HANNEOA«r,)in  his  speeefi 
the  other  duy,  produced  and  read  the  Morning  Chruni(?le  of.  I  bolieve, 
22d  August,  1843,  to  prove  some  British  opinion  about  the  Oregon.  1 
propose  to  cross-examine  his  witness;  and  will  put  upon  the  st.ind  for  that 
purpose  the  same  Morning  Chronicle  of  August  2Sth,  1843,  six  days  after 
the  date  of  the  paper  from  which  he  read.  It  is  an  opposition  paper,  and 
certainly  utters  itself  with  a  commendable    wrath  and  freedom.     After 

5 lancing  at  certain  easy  courses,  by  which  the  present  ministry  might  have 
one  themselves  honor  and  the  State  service,  the  writer  taunts  them 
in  the  bitterest  terms  with  pursuing  a  directly  opposite  policy  ;  with  nofe 
doing  this  from  fear  of  Louis  Philippe  ;  with  not  doing  that  from  fear  of 
Russia  ;  and,  among  other  things,  with  "  giving  up  the  Oregon,"  in  consid- 
eration of  having  lost  the  Northeastern  boundary  before!  Certainly,  if 
the  Senator's  witness  is  a  credible  one,  he  utterly  disproves  all  ministerial 
design  of  colonizing  the  Oregon. 

Take  another  piece  of  nvidcncc.  Here  is  an  article  on  "  the  fur  trade 
between  the  Northwest  coast  of  America  and  China,"  in  Fisher's  Colonial 
Magazine,  published  in  London,  April,  1843.  Very  probably  it  was  writ- 
ten by  an  agent  of  the  Hudson's  Bay  Company.  1  read  a  paragraph  from 
page  2:  "It  is  truly  mortifying  to  reflect  on  the  ignorance, imbecility, and 
negligence,  of  tlic  British  Government,  which  is  allowing  us  to  be  juggled 
out  of  this  coast,  one  of  the  finest  in  the  world,  and  unquestionably  be- 
longing to  us  by  the  right  of  priority  in  discovery."  The  last  part  of  the 
paragragh  contains  news;  but  what  docs  the  Senator  from  Pennsylvania 
say  to  the  former  ?  Mc  can  hardly  refuse  the  tribute  of  his  unwilling  ad^ 
miration  to  Great  Britain,  for  the  energy  with  which  "  she  pushes  her 
rights,"  or  rather  her  claims,  without  right.  "  She  is  rushing  forward,  ha 
says,  to  get  and  keep  the  country  !"  Whcteas,  here  is  an  unhappy  HudsoQ's> 
Bay  Company  proprietor,  beating  his  breast  and  pulling  out  his  hair,  be- 
cause he  cannot  move  such  "  a  dish  of  skimmed  milk"  as  the  British  Gov- 
ernment "to  an  honorable  action."  But  which  to  rely  on  .^  I  cannot 
help  thinking  that  this  writer  has  the  best  means  of  knowledge,  both  of 
Oregon  and  England  ;  and  he  calls  names  with  a  copiousness  and  hearti- 
ness that  shows  him  to  be  altogether  in  earnest. 

I  add  a  passage  or  two  from  the  British  Foreign  Review  of  .ItMuary^ 
1844.  In  an  article  "on  the  Oregon  Territory," the  writer  says:  "  Upon 
the  whole,  therefore,  the  Oregon  Territory  holds  out  no  great  promise  as 
an  agricultural  field."  "  We  have  seen  that  Oregon  oiTers,  upon  the  whole> 
very  little  inducement  to  agricultural  pursuits."  "  For  ourselves,  we  da 
not  set  any  great  value  upon  the  country  as  an  emigration  field,  either  for 
England  or  America." 

I  submit,  then,  sir,  that  the  British  Government  and  nation  at  home  ha& 
not  formed  the  design  of  colonizing  the  agricultural  regions  of  Oregqiu. 


>'■   irfiThii^jjMit 


33 


This  resertfffion  in  the  license  or  (he  company  strengthens  tho'prooAl  of 
this  fact.  But  for  (hat,  the  Senator  migh(  say,  nay,  has  said,  that  the  GbV- 
ernmcnt  had  no  right  as  against  (he  company  (o  colonize.  The'ri^ht'is 
gained,  and  yet  the  Government  does  nothing. 

Sir,  Great  Britain  is  not  in  the  Oregon  at  all,  except  in  and  by  the  Hud- 
son's Bay  Company.  She  has  no  fort,  nor  farm,  nor  town,  nor  traee^of 
footstep  there,  except  in  and  by  the  Hudson's  Bay  Company.  I  come  ntvr 
in  the  next  place  to  ask,  whether  (hat  company  opposes  (he  slightest  ob- 
stacle, in  point  of  fact,  to  (he  entrance  of  our  agricultural  8e(tlers  ?  And 
nothing  is  more  indisputably  cer(ain  (ban  (hat  it  does  no(.  In  one  way 
only  does  it  seem  to  be  probable  (ha(  it  will  do  so.  In  one  way  it  may. 
Send  on  armed  mounted  force  to  eject  those  persons ;  drive  them  hotoe, 
maimed  and  spoiled,  upon  (he  sympathies  and  the  pride  of  a  Government 
which  has  recorded  i(s  de(ermina(ion  (o  pro(ec(  (hem  from  violence,  and 
thus  indeed  they  may  become  an  obstacle  to  the  entrance  of  American 
agricultural  immigration.  Bu(  if,  avoiding  such  insanity  ns  (ha(,  you 
main(ain  the  existing  state  of  things;  if  under  (his  Convention  you  con- 
tinue to  enter  with  ploughshare  and  pruning  hook,  and  missionary,  twen- 
ty years  more  may  see  them  pass  away,  as  night,  to  the  more  congenial 
desert.  At  present,  I  say  again,  tha(  the  Company  does  no(,  in  point  of 
fact,  oppose  the  slightest  possible  counterac(ing  resistance  to  (hose  ten- 
dencies and  causes  which  are  giving  to  your  fanners  the  good  lands  of 
Oregon. 

We  must  distinguish  when  We  speak  of  the  Hudson's  Bay  Company. 
As  a  hunting  and  trading  organization,  it  is  very  formidable  indeed.  It 
wields  a  large  capital ;  occupies  and  owns  a  vast  region  on  this  side  of  the 
"htoUntains,  drained  by  the  waters  of  (he  Hudson's  Bay ;  i(  has  a  liceitse 
'of  trade  exclusive  of  all  British  subjects  over  that  region,  and  over  dther 
(i-acts  all  'but  boundless  on  both  sides  of  the  mountains ;  employs  agents  of 
great  ^kill,  acquired  by  long  experience,  and  exerts  a  decisive  contro(-upon 
itaahy  of  the  native  races,  in  (he  business  of  ob(aining  furs,  by  htindng, 
trapping,  or  (rade  with  Indians.  A  solitary  ship,  or  a  stranger  going  there 
once  or  twice  in  his  life,  stands  no  chance  with  such  a  body  as  this. 

But  thus  far,  sir,  the  company  opposes  no  obstacle  at  all  to  your  agri- 
cultural settlement.  The  truth  is  precisely  (hat  it  is  a  hun(ingcorpora(ion 
exclusively ;  itgiv^sno  attention  (o  agricuUure  ;  but  it  permits  i(s  retired 
servants  to  take  vp  farms  about  and  near  its  trading  posts  ;  and,  to  some 
tfxt^nt,  perhaps  a  hundred  of  these  retired  servants  nave  done  so.  These 
pei^ns  are'the  only  cultivators  of  Oregon,  excepting  your  own  couhtry- 
'then.  They  are  English,  French,  and  half  breeds.  With  them  your  set- 
tlers mingle  peaceably  ;  your  missionaries  preach  to  them  ;  and  they  are 
at'this  moment  coming  within  your  influence  ;  ready  to  receive  your 
laws  I  to  be  bldnded  with  your  countrymen  ;  to  be  enfolded  in  your  pi-o- 
ieeting  arms.  Meantime,  (he  Hudson's  Bay  Company  pursues  its  busi- 
'Itessof  seeking  furs ;  but  these  are  fast  disappearing;  and  as  the  game 
gdes  noHh,  the  hunter. must  follow.  The  process  which  is  going  on,  Then, 
in  th^  Oiffigbn,  is  exactly  this.  The  hunter  state  is  disappearing.  The 
agriculturil  state  is  succeeding;  and  your  settlers,  (he  farmer,  aind  the 
'mi&8ionary,'(tbd  the  retired  servants  of  the  Hudson's  Bay  Company,  its'ser- 
Mrttat^  ho  longer — these,  of  diverse  race,  but  with  kindred  Objects,  and  soon 


Ito  be  a  kit 

I  are  introd 

far,  the  H 

Sir,  the 

place,  tha 

ments  ;  ai 

own,  is  c< 

nize  for  a 

f  Its  whol( 

-f  mountain 

as  propri 

If  waters  of 

]  and  nothi 

grant  oni 

;:      The  S 

,  ■  pany  for 

proof tha 

some  lar| 

on  a  clbs 

charged 

company 

that  in  n 

it  expect 

of  the  n 

"The  pi 

eup'atlon  Oj 

Iheir  trade, 

with  the  1 

is  u  yet  of 

employ  mei 

rive  from  i 

"  That  I 

omment  fo 

whatAoevei 

when  it  ia 

country, 

amli  conM 

of  citizeiM 

from  the  1 

riea,  in  th 

gtoclchold) 

"The 

nnd  we  ni 

lion  for  tl 

of  farm*, 

This 
out,  WI 
modifif 
ing  an( 


33 


l^roofii  of 

the  Gbv. 

right'ji 


[to  be  •  kindred  colony,  all  sprung  from  you — these  are  the  instruments  who 
'are  introducing  the  agricultural  slate.     And  to  this  process,  I  repeat,  thus 
far,  the  Hudson's  Bay  Company  opposes  no  hinderance  ul  all. 

Sir,  the  proofs  of  all  parts  of  this  statement  are  conclusive.  In  the  flrst 
place,  that  the  company,  as  such,  has  no  agricultural  tastes  or  employ- 
ments ',  and  that  the  discharged  servants  are  the  only  farmers,  except  our 
own,  is  certain.  It  is  no  part  of  its  policy  or  even  of  its  |)owers  to  colo- 
nize for  agriculture.  It  is  a  trading  company.  Its  charter  makes  it  such. 
Its  whole  corporate  business  hasheen  to  trade  and  hunt.  West  of  the 
mountains  it  has  not  a  foot  of  land,  by  grant  even  from  England.  Its  title 
as  proprietor  is  confined  exclusively  to  lands  on  this  side,  drained  by  the 
waters  of  the  Hudson's  Bay.  On  the  west  side  it  has  a  license  to  trade, 
and  nothing  more.  It  cannot,  even  as  against  England,  hold  ;  it  cannot 
grant  one  acre  there  for  independent  agricultural  occupation. 

The  Senator  from  Pennsylvania  has  referred  to  the  petition  of  the  com- 
'  pany  for  a  renewal  of  their  license,  and  to  the  papers  attending  it,  for 
proof  that  they  meditated  agricultural  undertakings.  Doubtless,  there  are 
some  large  and  vague  intimations  of  such  a  purpose  or  such  a  hope.  But, 
on  a  closer  examination,  it  becomes  quite  clear  that  it  is  through  their  dis- 
charged servants  only  that  any  thing  agricultural  is  to  be  done  ;  that  the 
company  remains,  as  from  the  first  it  has  been,  a  hunter  and  trader ;  and 
that  in  neither  capacity  and  in  neither  employment  has  it  earned,  or  does 
it  expect  to  earn,  any  profits,  or  any  considerable  profits,  on  the  west  side 
of  the  mointains.     A  paragraph  or  two  will  suffice  to  show  this : 

"The  princip*!  brneflt  the  company  derive  from  the  cxriurive  licrnM  oftnule  in  ihe  peaeeabk  ot- 
tapatitm  of  their  oum  proper  territory,  from  which  they  draw  nearly  the  whuk  of  the  pnffiti  of 
their  trade,  aiid  for  the  protection  of  which  they  ha\e  a  right  to  look  to  Qovernment,  in  common 
with  the  rest  of  Her  Majetty'a  aubjects,  as  the  trade  of  the  country  embraced  in  the  royal  liceiuo 
is  a*  yet  of  very  litUe  benefit  to  them,  and  aflbrds  greater  advantages  to  the  mother  country,  in  the 
employment  of  shipping,  and  in  the  revenue  arising  from  imports  and  exports,  than  the  company  do. 
rive  from  it. 

"  That  the  Hudson  Bay  Company  have  the  strongest  possible  claims  upon  Her  Majesty's  Gov- 
ernment for  a  renewal  of  iYe  exclusive  license  of  trade,  without  any  rent  or  pecuniary  consideration 
whatsoever,  cannot,  I  should  hope,  admit  of  a  question,  after  the  explanation  I  have  |pven  ;  but 
when  it  is  considered  that  the  greater  part  of  the  country  to  which  the  license  applies  is  Indiait 
country,  opened  by  treaty  to  citizens  of  the  United  States  of  America  as  well  as  to  British  subjects* 
and,  consequently,  the  license  of  exclusive  trade  does  not  protect  the  company  from  the  competition 
of  citizens  of  the  United  States,  it  must  appear  evident  that  no  substantial  l)rncfit  is  likely  to  arise 
from  the  boon  we  are  soliciting,  beyond  the  probable  rneani  of  affording  pence  !i<  our  own  Territo- 
ries, in  the  tranquillity  of  which  Her  Majesty's  Government  oii);ht  to  feel  us  dcc;i  an  interest  as  tho 
stockholders  of  the  Hudson  Bay  Company." 

"  The  possession  of  that  country  to  Great  Britain  may  become  an  object  of  very  great  importance, 
and  we  are  strengthening  that  claim  ti-  it  (independent  of  the  claims  of  prior  discovery  and  occupa 
lion  for  the  ptirpose  oflndian  trailc, )  by  <brming  the  nueleun  of  a  colony,  through  the  cstaiblishraen  t 
of  farms,  and  the  settlement  of  tome  of  ow  retiring  officer!  and  lervants  at  agricuHuritts." 

This  petition,  whatsoever  purpoii?s  of  agricultural  achievement  it  held 
out,  was  presented  in  1837.  But  that  ■■:  truth  the  company  has  not  at  all 
modified  its  character  and  objects,  or  become  any  less  exclusively  a  hunt- 
ing and  trading  company  than  before,  all  evidence  concurs  to  ptove.    Mr. 


4 


: L_ 


24 


7 


Greenhow,  in  his  excellent  Memoir  on  the  subject,  published  in  May,  1840^ 
and  since  then  expanded  into  the  most  complete  and  most  authoritative 
work  on  the  whole  Oregon  question,  in  all  its  aspects,  which  has  ever  been 
written,  and  for  which  I  hope  to  unite  with  the  Senator  from  Pennsylvania,. 
and  the  whole  Senate,  in  remunerating  the  laborious  and  trustworthy  com- 
piler— Mr.  Greenhow  says,  three  years  after  this  petition  had  been  present- 
<ed  :  "  the  only  settlement  which  appears  to  have  been  made  under  the  r.u- 
spices  of  the  company  beyond  the  Rocky  Mountains  in  that  on  the  Walla- 
mette,  where  a  few  old  Canadian  voyageurs  are  permitted  to  reside  with  their 
Indian  wives  and  half'breed  families,  on  condition  of  remaining  faithful  to 
their  liege  lords  of  the  company.  In  the  neighborhood  of  each  large  fac- 
tory, indeed,  a  portion  of  ground  is  cleared  and  cultivated,  and  dwelling 
houses,  nulls,  and  shops  for  artisans,  are  erected  ;  but  these  improvements 
are  all  entirely  subservient  to  the  uses  and  objects  of  the  company,  all 
proceedings  not  strictly  connected  with  its  pursuits  being  discournged." 

I  read  now  from  the  British  Foreign  Review  of  January,  1844  :  "  The 
interests  of  the  company  are  of  course  adverse  to  colonization.'  "  The 
fur  trade  has  been  hitherto  the  only  channel  for  the  advantageous  invest- 
ment of  capital  in  those  regions." 

Indeed  it  is  plain,  that  such  a  company,  as  such,  can  do  nothing  in  agri' 
culture.  It  cannot  live  in  or  near  the  agricultural  state.  It  is  not  fields  of 
grain,  or  grass,  or  cattle,  or  pasture,  that  it  requires,  but  Indians  to  trade 
with,  beaver  and  muskrat  to  kill,  a  vast  wildcrnes^^  to  range  in,  one  whole 
region  of  which  it  may  hunt  over  this  year,  leaving  it  fallow  the  next,  to 
replenish  its  growth  of  savage  life.  It  cannot  blend,  it  canr.ot  contempo- 
raneously conduct,  agricultural  and  hunting  occupation.  There  is  a  sort 
of  chronological  incompatibility  in  it.  These  are  successive  states,  mark- 
ing successive  ages  of  man.  The  company  must  retire  before  the  agricul- 
tural life,  not  enjoy  it. 

In  the  next  place,  sir,  it  is  as  clear,  and  it  is  an  interesting  and  pleasing. 
Tact,  that  these  discharged  servants  of  the  company  possess  very  friendly 
dispositions  to  the  Government  of  the  United  States,  that  they  receive  our 
settlers  hospitably,  that  they  listen  gladly  to  the  instructions  of  our  mis- 
sionaries, and  that  they  anticipate  with  pleasure,  not  fear,  the  extension  of 
our  laws  and  the  unfolding  of  our  flag  upon  the  shores  of  their  tranquil 
sea.  Among  the  documents  accompanying  the  President's  message  of  this 
session,  is  a  letter  from  Dr.  Elijah  White,  our  sub  agent  beyond  the  Rocky 
Mountains.  He  is  a  genMeman,  as  I  learn  from  information  through  Mr. 
Crawford,  of  the  office  of  Indian  Affairs,  of  excellent  character,  whose 
appointment  to  his  present  office  was  warmly  urged  by  Mr.  Linn,  late  of 
this  Senate.     In  this  letter  he  says  : 

"I  think  I  mi'ntioiieil  llic  kind  and  hospituble  manner  wc  were  received  and  entertained  on  the 
■way  by  the  gentlemen  of  the  Hud«on'ii  Bay  Company,  and  the  cordial  and  most  handsome  recep- 
tion I  met  with  at  Fort  Vancouver,  from  Governor  McLaughlin,  and  his  worthy  associate  chicj. 
factor,  James  Douglass,  Esq.,  my  appointment  giving  pleasure  rather  than  pain— a  satisfactory  as^ 
surancc  that  these  worthy  gentlemen  intend,  eventually,  to  settle  in  this  country,  and  prefer  Am.'r- 
ican  to  English  jurisdiction. 

"On  my  arrival  in  the  colony,  sixty  miles  south  of  Vancouver,  Iwing  in  advance  of  the  party, 
and  comip,;  unexpectedly  to  the  citizens,  liearing  the  intelligence  of  the  arrival  of  so  large  a  rein- 
Ibrcemcn.',  and  giving  assurance  of  the  good  intentions  of  our  Government,  the  excitement  was 


1 

i 


general 
infant  ( 
"Ifo 
•doubled 
with  ou 
tion  of 
useful, 
nation  ( 
"A 
Bay  Ct 
say,  ha 
expense 
Hishal 
gentler 
industr 
lishcd  < 

Ar 

friem 

refer 

local 

lowe 

no  ti 

influ 

cane 

quar 

adja 

lt| 

prop 

retir 

or  c 

new 

to  ii 

owr 

I        Bay 

aiid 

*       be 

OV£ 

we 
ow 

of 

no 

;  an 

■n  stj 
Tl 
al 

f;  0 
ei 
ol 


■I 


in  May,  1840^ 
authoritative 
has  ever  been 
Pennsylvania^ 
tworthy  com- 
been  present- 
under  the  CM- 
on  the  VValla- 
lide  with  their 
i»g  faithful  to 
>ch  large  fac- 
nd  dwelling 
mprovements 
company,  ali 
cournged." 
1844  :  "The 
on.'      « The 
?eou.s  invcst- 

thing  in  agri- 
s  not  fields  of 
ians  to  trade 
>,  one  whole 
the  next,  to 
ot  coiitempo- 
here  is  a  sort 
states,  mark- 
e  the  agricul- 

and  pleasing, 
very  friendly 
'  receive  our 
s  of  our  mis- 
extension  of 
heir  tranquil 
Jssage  of  this 
id  the  Rocky 
through  Mr. 
acfer,  whose 
Linn,  late  of 

itertaincd  on  tlio 
iiandsome  recep. 
associate  chie, 
1  satisfactory  aa^ 
id  prclcr  Am.r- 

■e  oC  the  party, 
so  large  a  rein- 
xcitemcnt  wan 


25 

general  j  and  two  days  afler,  we  had  the  largwt  and  happiest  public  meeting  ever  convened  in  this 
infant  colony. 

"  I  found  the  colony  in  peace  and  health,  rapidly  increasing  in  numbers,  having  more  than 
"oubled  in  population  during  the  last  two  ycurs.  English,  French,  and  half  breeds,  seem  equally 
with  our  own  people  attached  to  the  .\mericaii  cause  ;  hence  the  bill  of  Mr.  I<inn,  prolTcring  a  sec 
tion  of  land  to  every  white  man  of  the  territory,  has  the  double  oilvontagc  of  licing  popular  and 
useful,  iiiircasing  such  attachment,  and  manifestly  acting  as  a  strong  incentive  to  all,  of  whatever 
nation  or  party,  to  settle  in  this  country. 

"  A  petition  started  from  this  country  to-day,  making  bitter  complaints  against  the  Hudson's 
Bay  Company  and  Governor  McLaughlin.  On  reference  to  it,  (as  a  copy  was  denied,)  I  shall  only 
say,  had  any  gentleman  disconnected  with  the  Hudson's  Bay  Company  been  at  half  the  pains  and 
expense  to  establish  a  claim  to  the  Wallamettc  falls,  very  few  would  have  raised  an  opposition- 
His  half-bushel  measure  I  know  to  be  exact,  according  to  the  English  imperial  standard.  The 
gentlemen  of  this  company  have  been  fathers  and  fosterers  of  the  colony,  ever  encouraging  peace, 
industry,  and  good  order,  and  have  sustained  a  character  lor  hospitality  and  integrity  too  well  estab- 
lished easily  to  be  shaken." 

And  this  is  fully  confirmed  by  those  who  regard  the  tact  with  an  iin- 
friendly  eye.  The  writer  in  the  Colonial  Magazine,  to  whom  1  have  just 
referred,  thus  complains:  "  By  a  strange  and  unpardonable  oversight  of  the 
local  officer  ol  the  company,  missionaries  from  the  United  States  were  al- 
lowed to  take  religioui^  charge  of  the  population  ;  and  these  artful  men  lost 
no  time  in  zntroducing  such  a  number  of  theii*  countrymen  as  reduced  the 
influence  of  the  small  number  of  British  settlers  into  complete  insignifi- 
cance. Unless  a  speedy  remedy  be  applied,  our  fellow-subjects  in  that 
quarter  will  soon  be  excluded  from  the  Columbia  river,  its  tributaries  and 
adjacent  countries." 

It  is  certain,  also,  in  the  next  place,  that  the  Hudson's  Bay  Company 
proper,  the  hunting  and  trading  company,  finds  already  that  its  game  is 
retiring  to  the  north  and  northeast ;  and  the  hunter  must  follow  his  game, 
or  cease  to  be  a  hunter.  You  have  seen  thai  in  the  application  for  a  re- 
newal of  the  license,  it  is  said  that  no  considerable  profits  weie  expected 
to  be  gathered  on  the  west  side  of  the  mountains;  that  it  was  upon  their 
own  proper  territory  on  this  side,  drained  by  the  waters  of  the  Hudson's 
Bay,  that  their  business  was  to  be,  if  any  where,  advantageously  pursued ; 
and  that  the  license  to  hunt  and  trade  on  the  west  side  was  expected  to 
be  useful  iniiinly  as  a  means  of  extending  and  perpetuating  that  influence 
over  the  indians,  and  that  monopolypeaceful  and  exclusive  range  of  their 
west,  which  would  ensure  them  the  a  prudent  husbandry  and  alternation 
own  territory,  and  enable  them,  by  a  prudent  husbandry  and  alternation 
of  crops,  hunting  in  one  season  on  one  tract,  and  the  next  on  atiother,  to 
prevent  or  postpone  the  total  destruction  of  game.  In  point  of  fact,  there  is 
no  doubt  that,  from  causes  wholly  uncontrollable  by  them,  the  fur-bearing 
animals  are  deserting  the  Oronon.  South  of  the  Coluuibia,  they  are  sub- 
stantially extinct.  They  are  disappearing  on  the  north  of  that  river. 
The  company  have  bought  out  the  interest  of  the  Russian  fur  hunters, 
above  54°  40' ;  they  are  explorin!;the  dim  neighborhood  of  the  Arctic  sea. 
One  age  and  state  cf  man  is  lading  away  in  the  Oregon,  and  another 
emerges  to  light.  Then-  is  not  an  acre  of  good  land  in  the  whole  valley 
of  the  Columbia,  that  is  not  even  now  ready  for  the  agriculture  of  civili- 


I 


-zaUon.  Sir,  letme  adv«rt  to  a  few  prbors  of  this.  A  ivriter  on'theijiib- 
ject  of  Turs  and  the  fur  trade,  in  a  paper  published  in  Silliman's  J^rhal, 
coneludes: 

*'  Prom  the  Toregoing  atatements,  it  appears  that  the  fiir  traile  must  henceforward  decline.  The 
advanced  state  of  geographical  science  shows  that  no  new  countries  remain  to  be  explored.  In 
North  America,  the  animals  are  slowly  decreasing,  from  the  persevering  eflbrts  and  the  indiscrim- 
inate slaughter  practised  by  the  hunters,  and  by  the  appropriation  to  the  uses  of  man  of  those 
forests  and  rivers  which  have  afforded  them  food  and  protection.  They  recede  with  the  aborigines, 
before  the  tide  of  civilization.". 

In  the  ai'tide  from  the  British  Foreign  Review,  to  which  I  made  rfefer- 
etice  before,  it  is  remarked:  '^  Even  now,  the  animals  yielding  Tors  and 
6kin9'are  safid  to  be  disappearing,  and  the  toils  of  the  hunters  and  trap- 
pers are  less  profitable  than  formerly.  The  Americans  are  not  p^obtibly 
dl&p!«ased  to  observe  this,  and  wduld  rejoice  still  ihore  if  the  doinphny 
should  find  it  necessary  to  abandon  these  regions;  but,  even  ifsubh  a  re- 
sult should  take  place,  it  would  be  some  time  before  (he  United  States 
eduld  be  prepiared  to  send  forth  any  large  body  of  settlers  to  the  country." 
You  perceive  that  he  does  not  suggest  a  doubt  that  the  A  inerican  wish 
'idii  be  gratified.  Again:  ''The  fur  trade  is  incompatible  with  the  pro- 
gress of  settlement,  and  must  gnidually  cease  as  the  occupation  of  the 
cOu'htry  proceeds."  But  I  pass  to  far  higher'authority  upon  the  subject.  In 
a  ispeech  of  ihe  late  Mr.  McRoberts,  of  Illinois,  delivered  in  this  place, 
at  the  I^st  session,  he  says:  "  The  leading  inducement  to  the  forination 
of  the  Convention,  which  as  to  facilitate  the  collection  of  furs  and  skins, 
has  almost  entirely  ceaisec  ;  and  particularly  in  the  country  south  of  the 
Columbia,  which  is  the  country  best  adapted  to  agricultural  pursuits.  The 
huM6r  has  laid  by  his  rifie  and  traps,  and  is  cultivating  the  land  for  a  sub- 
sistence. If  our  people  go  there,  (hey  must  pursue  the  mechanic  arts,  or 
he  ctiltivators  of  the  soil — not  hunters."  To  the  same  eflect,  sustaining 
in  (h^  fullest  inanner  my  entire  view,  were  the  remarks  of  his  colleague, 
Mr.  Young,  in  the  course  of  the  same  debate.  They  bear  with  decisive 
'Effect  ij|)on  ail  the  positions  which  I  have  assumed. 

"  It  struck  him  that  it  was  a  mistake  to  think  that  Great  Britain  will  ever  look  to  that  'territory 
for  agricultural  purpose'  And  herein  lay  a  great  difference  between  he.- views  and  ours.  They 
aio  in  fact  different,  and  yet  not  conflicting.  Wc  want  the  territory  for  agricultural  pursuitti  ihain- 
ly.  She  looks  to  it  for  the  main  p'lrsuit  of  the  Hudson's  Bay  Company,  which  is  the  tride  in 
fori."  "In  the  Oregon  Territory,  this  company,  not  having  for  iu  primary  object  agricuHUral 
pursuits,  never  have  encouraged  rtiore  culture  of  the  soil  than  necessary  for  the  temporary  sttpport 
of  its  tm^hyees.  But  with  our  citizens,  agriculture  must  be  the  primary  object.  We  have  al> 
eady  a  rrjmber  of  our  citizens  there,  engaged  in  this  pursuit.  There  is  no  jealousy  towA^ds  them 
on  the  part  of  the  Hudson'e  Buy  Company,  so  long  as  they  make  agriculture  their  primiry  pur- 
suit." 

And  again : 

"The  rtbst  friendly  feelings  are  evinced  by  the  empbiyees  of  the  Hudson  s  Bay  CompUiy  to- 
wards our  cifiiens  now  there.  They  give  no  offence  by  occupying  any  portion  of  tht  wjU  they 
please  in  Agriculture.  The  Hudsdn's  Bay  Cjmpany  can  have  no  objection,  and  will  it  ake  ri6ne, 
to  agricultural  settlements."     "There  is  nothing  Hkc  an  cflfort  or  disposition  on  the  part  of  the 


nC 


►say. 


;i! 


.17 


«7 


oii'iheijab- 
n's  JWriial, 

decline.  The 
explored.    In 

'  the  indiRetim- 
nian  of  those 

the  aborigines, 

nade  rtfer- 
g  furs  iind 
s  and  trsp- 
at  plrobaWy 
e  doinpahy 
'sabh  a  re- 
ted  States 

cbu'nlry." 
sricJin  wish 
th  (he  pro- 
ion  of  the 
ubjeet.  In 
this  place, 

fo'rfnad'dn 
and  skins, 
'Uth  of  the 
luits.  The 
I  for  a  sub  - 
Die  arts,  or 
sustaining 
colleague, 
h  decisive 


that  'territoiy 
uure.  They 
irenitt,  iiiain- 
the  trkde  in 
agricuhttml 
"aiy  Rtipport 
^e  have  al> 
owa^ds  them 
primiTy  pur- 


ludson's  Bay  ComT<any  to  make  permanent  agricultural  aettlcmcntit.    Theirs  is  a  mere  temportry 
cupation." 

Mr.  Linn  followed  Mr.  Young,  and  daid  : 

"  He  felt  it  unnecessary  to  consume  time  in  debate,  after  the  very  lucid  statement  of  the'Scna- 
or  from  Illinois,  placing  the  matter  on  the  plain  grounds  on  which  it  should  be  viewed." 

I  say,  then,  sir,  that  the  Hudson's  Bay  Company,  in  point  of  fact,  is 
Dpposing  no  obstacle  at  all  to  your  agricultural  entei prise  to  Ihe  Oregon, 
•either  the  hunter,  nor  the  discharget.  servant,  who  is  giving  his  few 
llast  and  fatigued  years  to  the  cultivation  of  the  land,  opposes  any  obsta- 
^cle.  There  is  no  obstacle  of  force,  or  fraud,  or  of  inhospitt^lity.  I  dare 
hay,  little  controversies  there  may  be,  such  as  there  are  every  where ; 
controversies  about  titles ;  first  possession ;  prices;  monopolies  of  grind- 
ing grain,  sawing  timber,  and  the  like  ;  such  as  the  memorial  presented 
by  the  Senator  from  Missouri  (Mr.  Atchison)  sets  forth ;  but  the  weight 
of  evidence,  from  all  sources,  is  most  decisive  to  show,  that  virith  the 
Hudson's  Bay  Company  proper  our  settlers  come  into  no  contact ;  and 
that  from  the  discharged  vmployeea,  the  British,  French,  and  half-breed 
farmers,  they  have  experienced  generally  the  most  hospitable  and  the 
kindest  reception.  Already  we  are,  in  numbers,  more  than  two*  to-  their 
one.  The  whole  number  of  persons,  all  told,  in  the  employment  of  the 
company  in  the  Oregon,  or  discharged,  and  cultivating  the  soil,'  Joes  not 
exceed  a  thousand.  We  have,  I  think,  seven  missionary  stations,  from 
two  hundred  miles  south  of  the  Columbia  to  Paget's  sound,  one  hiindred 
and  forty  miles  north  of  it ;  we  have  two  thousand  persons  there ;  we 
have,  beyond  doubt,  the  best  grazing  and  best  wheat  country  in  Ihe  whole 
territory,  the  valley  of  the  Wallamelte,  which  some  visiters  liken,'  foi*  fer- 
tility and  almost  to  extent,  to  New  York. 

The  Senator  from  Pennsylvania,  however,  twice  or  thrice  takes  rare 
to  tell  you  that  "  the  Hudson  Bay  Company  had  murdered  four  or  five 
hundred  of  our  citizens,  as  we  had  learned  from  good  authority,  either 
directly  with  their  own  hands,  or  indirectly  through  the  agency  of  the 
Indians,  who  were  under  their  exclusive  control.  They  had  murdered 
and  expelled  all  our  citizens  who  had  gone  there  for  the  purpose  of  inter- 
fering with  thsir  hunting  and  trafficking  and  trading." 

The  Senator  does  not  assert  that  they  have  murdered  or  expelled  any 
body  who  went  there  to  settle.  My  proposition,  therefore,  he  has  not  as- 
sailed. But,  from  the  terms  of  his  actual  statement,  I  apprehend' the  Sen- 
ate-would derive  an  impression,  undesigned  by  him,  undesigned,  certaiinly, 
if  it  be  an  erroneous  impression,  which  is  utterly  unsupported  by  the  facts. 
Sir,  the  statement  of  the  Senator  has  no  sort  of  application  to,  and  com- 
poses no  part  of,  and  throws  no  light  on,  the  existing  policy  or  purposes 
of  that  company,  or  on  the  actual  circumstances  under  which  our  citi- 
zens go  to  that  country  to-day.  Why,  sir,  when  were  these  four  or  "  five 
hundred"  murdered?  In  whose  administration?  Where?  How?  Un- 
der what  circumstances  ?  Will  it  not  surprise  you  to  learn  thi>t  all  this 
was  more  than  fif^.een  years — much,  much  of  it  more  than  thirty  years 
ago?  Will  it  not  surprise  you  still  more  to  learn  that  the  circumstances 
in  which  it  happened  are  such  as  to  leave  it  a  matter  of  utter  uncertainty 
whether  the  company,  directly  or  indirectly,  with  intention,  caused  the 
death  of  one  of  the  four  or  five  hundred  ?    While  upon  the  whole  proof, 


88 


it  will  appear,  that  within  the  last  fifteen  years,  probably  a  much  longer 
period,  they  certainly  have  not  caused  or  procured  the  murder  of  on^ 
nian ! 

Before  the  year  1821,  there  were  two  great  companies,  the  Hudson's 
Bay  Company  and  the  Northwest  Company,  which  contended  for  the 
furs  of  'he  northwest  portions  of  North  America.  They  carried  the  com- 
petition 9  the  extent  of  an  actual  civil  war.  Affairs  almost  amounting  to 
battles  we.'e  fought.  Blood  was  shed.  The  most  painful  scenes  of  vio- 
lence, crueltV,  insubordination,  and  selfish  disregard  of  the  rights,  inter- 
ests, and  lives  of  nien,  were  exhibited  ;  and  this  disgraceful  and  distress- 
ing state  ot  th  ngs  was  continued  for  years,  and  over  almost  all  the  un- 
bounded wilde-ness  which  spreads  itself  out  among  and  on  each  side  of 
the  Rorky  Mountttins,  is  traversed  by  the  waters  of  the  Hudson's  Bay, 
and  subsides  towards  the  Arctic  sea.  The  consequence  was,  of  course, 
that  all  control  of  the  Indians  was  lost.  Spirituous  liquors  were  freely 
introduced  among  them.  Their  treacherous  and  ferocious  natures  were 
stimulated  by  all  sorts  of  appliances ;  and  there  is  no  doubt  that  many 
American  citizens,  hunters  and  trappers,  among  and  on  each  side  of  the 
mountains,  and  about  the  heads  of  the  upper  Mississippi  and  upper  Mis- 
souri, lost  their  lives  by  the  hands  of  these  wild  men.  It  has  been  esti- 
mated, and  1  do  not  kn^w  that  it  has  not  been  truly  estimated,  that  be- 
tween 1808,  or  a  few  years  earlier,  and  1821,  or  a  few  years  later,  but 
before  1829,  five  hundred  American  citizens  were  'hus  murdered.  They 
were  murdered  by  Indians,  wearing  European  blankets;  armed  with  Eu- 
ropean rifles;  drunk  upon  European  spirits.  So  much  we  know.  Per- 
haps it  is  all  we  know. 

In  1821,  the  two  companies  were  united  in  the  Hudson  Bay  Com- 
pany. The  scene  was  changed  immediately.  The  white  men  no  longer 
quarrelled  among  themselves.  The  Indians  were  subjected  to  a  more 
perfect  and  better  administered  surveillance.  Spirituous  liquors  were  ex- 
cluded. The  reign  of  law  and  order  was  restored,  and  has  in  the  main 
been  preserved  ever  since.  And  from  that  time,  1  compute  from  1821, 
or  a  few  years  later,  1S26  or  1828,  I  deny  that  there  is  a  particle  of  evi- 
dence that  the  Hudson's  Bay  Company,  or  any  body  else,  civilized  or 
savage,  by  their  procurement,  has  murdered  any  American  citizen  any 
where. 

Indian  murders  since  that  time  there  may  have  been;  but  what  I  say 
is,  that  I  have  not  seen  a  scrap  of  proof  that  they  were  instigated,  directly 
or  indirectly,  by  this  company.  Whether  the  murders;  of  that  earlier  pe- 
riod were  instigated  by  any  white  trader,  I  have  not  inquired,  and  do  not 
know.  Let  me  refer  you  to  the  account  the  company  give  of  this  matter 
themselves,  in  the  petition  to  which  the  Senator  from  Pennsylvania  has 
referred  : 

"It  unncoCMuiry  to  say  more  of  the  easier  competition  into  whirli  this  ossociiition  entered  with  the 
Huilxort  Bay  Company  for  the  trade  of  the  Indian  districts,  or  of  the  scenes  of  demoralization 
and  dentruction  of  life  und  property  to  wliich  it  led,  than  to  refer  your  Lordship  to  tljc  ample  de- 
tail* on  this  revolting;  subject  in  the  Colonial  Department ;  to  the  af^rrecmcnts  at  last  entered  into 
lietween  the  rival  companies  to  put  an  end  to  them  by  the  union  of  their  interests  in  1821." 

"Great  loss  of  property,  and  in  some  cases  loss  of  life,  have  been  incurred  by  savage  and  mur- 
ilcroos  attacks  oi.   their  hunt-ng  parties  and  establishments,  and  order  haa  only  been   restored  and 


ice  maintoi 
ise,  on  the  p 
'  Under  tl 
Hies  from  Eui 
■tending  to  th 
breaking  up  ( 
By  that 
country  in  a 
I  property,  lm\ 
Indians  has, 
:much  reduce 
•Stive  populatic 

J       You    S( 

W  years  ago 

*  no  light  0 

^immigran 

jthe  siigh 

obstacle  i 

tionof  th 

will  judg 

Well, 

sir,  only, 

not  prete 

He  exhil 

no  proof 

the  Orcj 

lifting  at 

this  istu( 

new  dev 

ibody.     I 

Well, 

our  eye 

IWatch  d 

lect  the 

ivorld. 

irty. 

In  the 

It.     Y 

with 

les  and 

'hen  th 

looks  ii 

ade  is 

le  timi 

jeise'ft 

■*  I  do  r 

rection 

#y  may 

;?ib  new 

ptake.ai 


29 


niueh  longer 
lurder  of  one 

the  Hudson's 
nded  for  the 
Tied  the  com- 
amounling  to 
snenes  of  vio- 
rights,  inter- 
and  distress- 
ost  all  the  un- 
each  side  of 
udson's  Bay, 
'as,  of  course, 
were  freely 
natures  were 
ibt  that  manv 
ch  side  of  the 
id  upper  Mis- 
has  been  esti- 
ated,  that  be- 
>arKi  later,  but 
lered.     They 
ned  with  Eu- 
know.     Per- 

in  Bay  Coin- 
ncn  no  longer 
ed  to  a  more 
uors  were  ex- 
i  in  the  main 
B  from  1821, 
irticle  of  evi- 
?,  civilized  or 
I   citizen  any 

ut  what  I  say 
ated,  directly 
at  earlier  pe- 
lt and  do  not 
f  this  matter 
Jsylvania  has 

entered  with  the 
if  demoralization 
to  the  ample  dc- 
lart  entered  into 
n  1821." 
navage  and  mur- 
«n  restored  and 


r 


ce  maintained  by  the  ^employment,   at  a  RTeat  expenie,  of  conrnderablo  force,  and  by  the  exer- 
ise,  on  the  part  of  their  liervants,  of  tlie  utmost  temper,  patience,  and  persevcraneo." 

Under  that  arrangement,  his  liordnhip,  at  a  very  heavy  expense,  ronveyed  several  hundred  fam- 
lies  from  Europe  to  thut  i<ettlemeut  ;  but  the  evils  attendant  on  the  competition  in  the  fur  trade  ex> 
Itcnding  to  this  settlement,  orrasioncd  serious  breaches  of  the  peace,  much  loss  of  life,  and  tlie 
breaking  up  or  abandonment  of  the  settlement  by  the  whites  on  two  ditl'orcnt  occasions, " 

"By  that  report  it  will  moreover  \te  seen  that  the  animosities  and  feuds  which  kept  the  Indian 
country  in  a  state  of  continued  disturbance,  extending  to  the  loss  of  lives  and  to  the  destruction  of 
])roperty,  have,  since  1831,  entirely  censed  ;  that  the  sale  or  distribution  of  spirituous  liquors  to  the 
Indians  has,  in  most  parts  of  the  country,  been  entirely  discontinued,  and  in  all  other  parts  so 
much  reduced  rh  to  be  no  longer  an  evil ;  and  that  the  moral  and  religious  improvement  of  the  na* 
^ive  population  has  been  greatly  promoted." 

You  sec  then,  sir,  that  these  murders  were  committed  from  15  to  30 
years  ago.  By  whomsoever  done,  by  whomso'.'Ver  procured,  they  throw 
no  light  on  the  exigtin<;  dispositions  of  the  rjmpany  towards  agricultural 
immigrants  from  the  United  States;  and  they  do  not  iiripugn  or  qualify  in 
the  Hiightest  degree  the  universality  and  the  truth  of  my  position,  that  no 
obstacle  is  now  actually  opposed  by  any  body  to  our  agricultural  occupa- 
tion of  the  Oregon.  I  have  given  you  the  proofs  of  that  position, and  you 
will  judge  of  them. 

Well,  what  does  the  Senator  from  Pennsylvania  reply  to  all  this .-"  Why, 
sir,  only,  and  exactly,  that  it  is  too  good  to  last.  That  is  all.  He  does 
not  pretend  that  Great  Biitain  is  now  colonizing  the  country  agriculturally. 
He  exhibits  no  proof  that  she  now  meditates  such  a  thing.  He  exhibits 
no  proof  that  she  now  cherishes  the  purpose  of  building  forts  or  marts  in 
the  Oregon.  He  exhibits  no  proof  that  the  Hudson's  Bay  Company  is 
lifting  a  linger  to  keep  your  farmers,  artisans,  or  missionaries,  from  it.  But 
this  is  too  good  to  last !  Great  Britain  will  certainly  break  out  into  some 
new  development  of  policy.  The  Hudson's  Bay  Company  will  kill  some- 
body.    It  is  impossible  that  this  state  of  things  should  last. 

Well,  sir,  perhaps  it  is.     What  then.'     I  will  tell  you  what  then.    Keep 
eye  always  open,  like  the  eye  of  your  own  eagle,  upon  the  Oregon. 
IWatch  day  and  night.     If  any  new  developments  of  policy  break  forth, 

eet  them.     If  the  time  changes,  do  you  change.     New  thinirs  in  a  new 
hvorld 
krty 


rour 


Eternal  vigilance  is  the  condition  of  empire  as  well  as  of  lib- 


rln  the  inea>.  time,  you  sec  the  existing  state  of  things.  You  see  fhe  pres- 
ftit.     You  are  sure  that  you  se^  it.     Govern  yourselves  accordingly.     Go 
(*dph  with  your  negotiation.     Go  on  with  your  emigration.     Are  not  the  ri- 
les .•».nd  the  wheat  growing  together  side  by  side  ?     Will  it  not  be  easy, 
Krhen  the  inevitable  hour  comes,  to  beat  back  ploughshare  and  pruning 
kooks  into  their  original  forms  of  instruments  of  death  .'     Alas!  that  (hat 
rade  is  so  easy  to  learn,  and  so  hard  to  forget  !     Who  now  living  will  see 
he  time  when  nations  shall  learn  war  no  more ;  when  the  wicked  shall 
|e^8e'  A'om  troubling,  and  the  weary  be  at  rest,  on  this  side  the  grave'  .*      i 
r  Ido  not  follow  Senators,  therefore,  a  step  in  their  speculations  on  the  di« 
Irection  which  any  new  policy  of  England  or,t^e  Hudson's  Bay  Compa-, 
hy  may  take  in  the  Oregein.,    Where  no  man  knows  whether  there  is  to  be 
k  new  p9l,icy.3{  alj,  it, is  vain  and  idle  to  begin  to  guess  what  shape  it  may 
|lake,  and  what  details  it  may  involve.     Wait  and  see.     Wait  and  see. 


80 


The  Senator  wonders  at  the  "  inconsistency"  with  which  the  Senator 
from;  Massachusetts  told  the  Senate  that  Great  Britain  would  go  to  war 
for  Oregon,  and  in  the  next  breath  that  the  Hudson  Bay  Company  would 
abandon  it  without  a  "  struggle."  What  inconsistency  ?  I  said  that  the 
Hudson's  Bay  Company  were  hunters,  not  farmers ;  that  their  game  was 
retiring  northward,  and  inland,  and  (hat  the  hunter  had  already  followed 
and  would  follow  his  game  ;  and  that  even  now  he  had  left  your  agricul- 
tural settlers  to  lay  the  foundation  of  their  colony  in  peace  ;  and  seen 
without  a  struggle  his  influence  upon  his  own  retired  employeetj  and  on 
your  countrymen,  annihilated  by  American  missionaries  and  American 
predilections.  I  said  that  England  did  not  in  point  of  fact  interfere  with 
this;  but  that,  if,  anticipating  and  disturbing  the  natural  course  of  things, 
you  urge  on  a  forcible  attack  upon  the  yet  lingering  company  ;  burn 
their  stockade  forts;  rob  them  of  their  peltries,  and  shed  their  blood,  Eng- 
land had  expressly  declared,  in  the  negotiation  of  1827,  that  she  would 
interpose,  and  that  it  was  probable  that  she  would.  Where  is  the  incon- 
sistency of  one  of  my  views  with  the  other .' 

The  Senator  says,  also,  "  to  imagine  England  was  going  to  give  up  the 
right  of  colonizing  in  Oregon  without  a  struggle  was  to  imagine  what 
seemed  very  strange,  not  to  say  impossible."  Well,  sir,  if  it  is  impossi- 
ble, there  is  an  end  of  it.  We  will  wait  and  see.  But  does  not  the  f^ena- 
tor  himself  expressly  tell  us  that  "  England  is  too  wise  to  risk  a  war  for 
the  possession  of  that  country  ?"  That  it  is  a  moral  impossibility  at  this 
day,  in  the  nineteenth  century  of  the  Christian  era  ?"  '■'■  That  she  would 
not  go  to  war  with  us,  unless  upon  a  question  where  her  honor  was  con- 
cerned ?"  which  I  undeistand  him  to  suppose  is  not  concerned.  If  it  is 
impossible  she  should  risk  a  war  for  the  country,  and  yet  also  impossible 
to  imagine  she  will  yield  it  without  a  struggle,  why,  she  must  look  to  her- 
self. :  But  if  the  Senator  is  right  in  the  last  opinion  which  he  expressed, 
which  was  that  she  would  not  fight  unless  the  point  of  honor  became  in- 
volved, why  may  she  not  go  on,  as  now  she  does,  allowing  events  to  take 
their  own  course?  Why  is  it  not  a  graceful  and  obvious  way  of  disen- 
gaging herself  from  connexion  with  a  subject  for  which  she  is  said  to  be 
too  wise  to  fight  ?  On  one  of  the  Senator's  views  of  the  matter,  this 
would:  seem  exactly  the  sensible  and  easy  policy.  But  again  I  say,  wait 
and  see ! 

I  observe  that  the  British  and  Foreign  Reviewer  advances  the  sugges- 
tion, that  we,  or  our  settlers,  are  welcome  to  all  the  agricultural  Oregon ; 
but,  the  British  Government  will  seek  to  letain  a  common  use  of  the  riv- 
ers and  the  harbor  of  Fuca.  Well,  now,  in  this  1  think  I  see  the  whole 
question  collapsing  into  a  pretty  small  and  very  manageable  thing.  In  the 
first  place,  the  nation  that  owns  the  land  will  be  likely,  if  it  chooses,  to  bold 
rivers  and  harbor.  In  the  next  place,  as  the  game  retires,  the  use  of  these 
becomes  of  less  and  less  importance  to  Great  Britain.  In  the  third  place, 
I  do  not  know  that  permission  of  a  temporary  and  restricted  enjoyment  of 
these  waters,  in  general  subordination  to  our  right,  involves  any  very  ter- 
rific, consequences.  Witness  the  case  of  the  St.  John.  And  finally,  by 
greM'had  luckv there  is.but  pne  harbor;  and  the  rivers  are  good  foi  noth- 
ing.!. "  The  rivers  of  Western  America,"  says  Mr.  Greenhow, "  present  in 
fact  fenTyOr  no  facilities  for  commercial  transportation.  .  They  pearly  aU 


n 


31 


the  Senator 
d  go  to  war 
ipany  wauld 
said  that  the 
»ir  game  was 
ady  followed 
your  agrioul- 
ie ;  and  seen 
yce«,  and  on 

American 
nterfere  with 
rse  of  things, 
npany  ;  burn 
r  blood,  Eng- 
at  she  would 

the  incon- 

>  give  up  the 
imagine  what 

it  is  impossi- 
lot  the  !?ena- 

isk  a  war  for 
ibility  at  this 
lat  she  would 
inor  was  con- 
ned. If  it  is 
so  impossible 
[t  look  to  her- 
he  expressed, 
>r  became  in- 
;vent9  to  take 
way  of  disen- 
is  said  to  be 
i  matter,  this 
n   I  say,  wait 

!s  the  suggea- 
ural  Oregon ; 
se  of  the  riv- 
ee  the  whole 
hing.  in  the 
ooses,  to  hold 
?  use  of  these , 
e  third  place^ 
enjoyment  of 
iny  very  ter- 
id  finally,  by . 
ood  foi  noth- 
, "  present  in 
ey  pearly  all 


run  io  their,  whole  course  through  deep  ravines  among  stony  mountains; 
and  they  are  frequently  interrupted  by  ledges  or  accumulations  of  rock, 
producingfalls  and  rapids,  to  overcome  which,  all  the  resources  of  ari 
would  probably.  bOv unavailing.'.' 

Senators  tell  us  that  England  maintains  Gibraltar  and  Malta  on  points, 
about  :Which  she  owns  no  agricultural  settlements;  and  therefore  infer  sLe 
will -jiover  be  easy  tiir  she  hears  that  encircling  and  importunate  drum 
beat  on  the  desert  coast  of  the  Northwest.  Well,  sir,  I  cannot  say.  If' 
shje  begins  to  build  a  Gibraltar  there,  do  you  begin  too.  Let  your  walls 
ascend  with  hers.  Go  up  with  her  story  by  story ;  a  tier  of  guns  for  eve- 
ry new,  one  she  plants ;  and  the  day  when  she  throws  out  the  red  cross 
flag  from  the  turret  of  her  consummated  structure,  cast  abroad  the  radi- 
ant stainless  stars  and  stripes,  to  tell  her  that  there  "  foreign  dominion 
shall  tiot  come."  In  the  mean  time,  let  me  say  that  this  Gibraltar  and 
Malta  analogy  does  not  seem  to  me  very  direct.  Gibraltar  and  Malta  are 
men  of  war  harbors,  where  whole  armadas  may  lie  afloat,  directly  on  both' 
the  old  and  both  the  modern  routes  of  commerce  from  Europe  to  the 
East ;  points  from  which  a  British  fleet  may  unmoor,  and  in  ten  days  strike 
with  thunder  the  walls  of  one  or  more  cities  of  how  many  of  the  nations 
of  Europe,  Asia,  and  Africa  !  Portugal,  Spain,  France,  Italy,  Austria,* 
Greece,  Russia,  by  the  Black  Sea,  Turkey,  Syria,  Egypt,  Algiers.  To 
argue  from  her  tenacious  possession  of  such  places  a  necessary  desire  to 
see  new  Gibraltars  and  new  Maltas  rise  under  the  49th  degree  of  north 
latitude  upon  the  Northwest  coast,  does  not  strike  me  as  extremely  co- 
gent. 

One  event  there  is,  sir,  which  may  change  your  policy  and  hers,  which' 
I  marvel  not  to  have  heard  adveKed  to.  If  in  five  or  ten  years  the  isthmus 
of  Panama  is  cut  through,  and  thus  'a  new  track  of  commerce  paved  out 
in  the  sea;  if  that  great  triumph  of  man  over  the    world  of  matter  is 
achieved;  if  that  marriage  of  oceans  is  really  celebrated,  then  new  and 
intense  importance  may  be  given  to  new  lands,  and  new  seas;  to  the  Sand- 
wich Islands,  to  California,  to  San  Francisco,  possibly  to  the  harbor  of. 
Fuca  itself.     He  who  lives  to  see  that  new  earth,  and  those  new  heavens, 
will  have  new  and  appropriate   duties  to  perform,  and  new  and  suffi- 
cient lights  by  which  to  perform  them.     In  the  mean  time,  we  are  here. 
Wc  have  the  present  to  work  in  and  provide  for.     Our  situation  is  the 
teacher  and  the  limit  of  our  duty.     Long,  long  b^fore  that  day,  I  hope 
this  question  will  have  been  adjusted,  and  have  taken  its  place  among  the , 
follies,  among  the  trivialities,  of  which,  a  hundred  years  hence,  men  shall, 
read  with  ineredulity  and  astonishment,  that,  for  such  things.  Christian 
nations  were  once  near  shedding  each  other's  blood. 

In  the  expression  of  this  hope,  Mr.  President,  I  believe  I  speak  for  my 
country.     It  is  true  that  the  Senator  from  Pennsylvania  has  said  : 

"He  admitted  with  regret  that  there  were  some  very  dangerous  symptoms  between  the  two 
countries.  The  whole  press  of  Great  Britain,  for  the  last  two  years,  had  teemed  with  abuse  of 
America,  and  all  that  was  American— our  institutions,  and ,  every  thing  coiuiected  with  us,  had 
bee;i  made  the  subject  of  perpetual  vituperation. 

"  All,  he  had  read  was  substantially  of  the  same  tenor — tlu:  abuse  was  unexampled  in  any  fop* 
mer  time.     And,  on  the  other  hand,  among  ourselves,  though  there  were  many,  in  out  large  cities, 


32 


cHproially,  who  nntortaincd  a  warmth  of  feeling  towards  England — insomuch  that  on  a  great  public 
occanion,  in  one  of  the  Inrgoat  of  those  cities,  the  health  of  "the  PresidertI  of  the  United  States"  had 
been  drunk  in  silence,  while  that  of  "  Queen  Victoria  "  hud  been  received  with  acclamation — yet 
with  the  srent  iimss  of  our  pcoi)|p,  a  very  diifcrent  feeling  prevailed.  They  still  remembered  the 
wrongs  we  had  endured  in  days  past ;  they  remembered  these  things  perhaps  with  too  deep  a  sen- 
sibility' And  although  Senators  might  please  their  ears  with  the  terms  "mother"  and  "daughter,* 
a  vast  majority  of  our  people  were  penetrated  with  the  conviction  that  to  us  England  had  ever  acted 
the  part  of  a  cruel  step-mother.  It  was  this  deep-wrought  conviction,  these  associations  of  former 
scenes,  that  lay  at  the  foundation  of  the  national  enmity,  which  too  extensively  prevailed.  Injurieii 
on  one  side,  and  their  remembrance  on  the  other,  kept  up  this  ill  blood.  Besides,  even  were  it 
otherwise,  the  American  people,  as  one  man,  felt  that  ^there  was  a  calamity  even  greater  than  that 
of  war,  and  that  was  a  sacrifice  of  the  national  honor. " 

But  is  tliisso.'  Is  it  so,  that  the  greut  mass  of  the  people  of  this  coun- 
try are  pervaded,  are  "  penetrated"  by  a  deep-seated,  "  deep-wrought" 
"sentiment  of  national  enmity"  towards  this  particular  nation  England  .' 
Is  it  so,  that  our  veins  are  tilled  with  "  ill  blood  "  towards  that  country  ;  ill 
blood  generated  and  fed  by  the  "  memory  of  wrongs  enduicd  in  days 
past .'"  This  I  understand  the  Senator  to  allege,  and  even  to  regret.  I 
have  repeated  to  you,  however,  exactly  what  he  says,  to  be  interpreted  by 
yourselves.  But  thus  I  undeistand  it.  The  cherished  remembrance  of 
^vrongs  endured  in  past  days,  the  conviction  that  England  had  ever  acted 
the  part  of  a  "  cruel  step-mother  ;"  the  "  associations  of  former  scenes," 
these  bitter  memories,  compone  the  deep  foundations  of  a  too  extensive  na- 
tional hostility  ;  these  things  make  the  great  body  of  the  people  enemies 
of  England,  in  a  time  of  profound  peace.  Thus  I  interpret  the  Senator. 
Is  this  so  i* 

Being,  sir,  through  the  favor  of  a  kind  Providence,  one  of  the  people 
of  America  myself;  and  having  been  born  and  bred,  not  in  cities,  which 
are  said  to  love  England,  but  in  the  country,  which  is  said,  as  1  understand 
the  honorable  Senator,  to  hate  her ;  and  having  been  astonished  and  pain- 
ed to  hear  it  asserted  that  such  a  people.  One  of  as  happy,  generous,  and 
kind  a  nature  as  the  sun  shines  on,  were  laboring  under  a  sentiment  so 
gloomy  and  so  barbarous  as  this,  I  have  been  revolving  the  subject  with 
some  care  and  with  some  feeling.  Exhausted  as  1  am,  and  as  you  are,  I 
cannot  sit  down  without  denouncing,  in  the  first  place,  the  sentiment  thus, 
as  I  understand  the  Senator,  ascribed  by  him  to  my  countrymen,  as  immor- 
al, unchristian,  unehivalfous,  unworthy  of  good  men,  unworthy  of  "gal- 
lant men,  and  men  of  honor ;"  and  without,  in  the  second  place,  expressing 
my  entire  and  profound  conviction  that  no  such  sentiment  inhabit^  the 
bosom  of  the  American  people.  Sir,  I  thank  the  Senators  from  Kentucky 
and  Virginia  ( Mr.  Ckittbnden  and  Mr.  Rives  )  for  their  notice  of  this  part 
of  the  honorable  Senator's  address.  With  my  last  words,  if  I  knew  1  were 
about  to  speak  them,  would  I  unite  my  judgments  and  feelings  on  this 
subject  with  them. 

Mr.  President,  we  must  distinguish  a  little.  That  there  exists  in  this 
country  an  intense  sentiment  uf  nationality  ;  a  cherished,  snergetic  feeling 
and  consciousness  of  our  independent  aiid  separate  national  existence  ;  a 
feeling  that  we  ha^'*e  a  transcendent  de^t^ny  to  fulfil,  which  we  mean  to  ful- 
fil ;  a  great  work  to  do,  which  We  know-how  todo,  and  are  able  to  do ;  a 
career  to  run,  iip  which  we  Hope  to  ascend  till  we  stand  on  the  steadfast 


33 

and  glittering  summits  of  the  world  ;  a  feeling  that  we  are  surrounded  and 
attended  by  a  noble,  historical  group  ofconipetitors  and  rivals,  the  other  na- 
tions of  the  earth,  all  of  whom  we  hope  to  overtake  and  even  to  distance — 
such  a  sentiment  as  this  exists  perhaps  in  the  character  of  this  people. 
And  this  I  do  not  discourage  ;  I  do  not  condemn.  It  is  easy  to  ridcule 
it.  But  "grand  swelling  sentiments"  of  patriotism  no  wise  man  will  de- 
spise. They  have  their  uses.  They  help  to  give  a  great  heart  to  a  na- 
tion ;  to  animate  it  .'jr  the  various  conflict  of  its  lot ;  to  assist  it  to  work 
out  for  itself  a  more  exceeding  weight  and  to  fill  a  larger  measure  of 
glory.  But,  sir,  that  among  these  useful  and  beautiful  sentiments,  pre- 
dominant among  them,  there  exists  a  lempet  of  hostility  towards  this  one 
particular  nation,  to  such  a  degree  as  to  amount  to  a  habit,  a  trait,  a  na- 
tional passion,  to  amount  to  a  state  of  feeling  which  "  is  to  be  regretted," 
und  which  really  threatens  another  war — this  I  earnestly  and  confident- 
ly deny.     I  would  not  hear  your  enemy  say  this. 

Sir,  the  indulgence  of  such  a  sentiment  by  the  people  supposes  them 
to  have  forgotten  one  of  the  counsels  of  Washington.  Call  to  mind  the 
ever  seasonable  wisdom  of  the  Farewell  Address  : 

"The  nation  which  indulges  towards  another  an  habitual  hatred,  or  an  habitual  fondneu,  is  in 
como  degree  a  slave.  It  is  a  slave  to  its  animosity  or  to  its  oflection,  either  of  which  is  sufficient  to 
to  lead  it  astray  from  its '  duty  and  its  interest.  Antipathy  in  one  nation  against  another  disposes 
each  more  readily  to  offer  insult  and  injury,  to  lay  hold  of  sUght  causes  <Sf  umbrage,  and  to  b* 
haughty  and  intractable,  when  accidental  or  trifling  occasions  of  dispute  occur.  Hence  frequent 
collisions,  obstinate,  envenomed,  and  bloody  contests.  The  nation  prompted  by  ill  will  and  resent- 
mcntsometimes  impels  to  war  the  Government,  contrary  to  the  best  calculations  of  policy.  The 
Government  sometimes  participates  in  the  national  propensity,  and  adopts,  through  passion,  what 
reason  would  reject ;  at  other  times,  it  makes  the  animosity  of  the  nation  subservient  to  projects  of 
hostility,  instigated  by  pride,  ambition,  and  other  sinister  and  pernicious  motives.  The  peace  often, 
sometimes  perhaps  the  liberty  of  nations,  has  been  the  victim." 

No,  sir.  No,  sir.  We  are  above  all  this.  Let  the  highland  clansman, 
half  naked,  half  civilized,  half  blinded  by  the  peat  smoke  of  his  cavern, 
have  his  hereditary  enemy  and  his  hereditary  enmity,  and  keep  the  keen, 
deep,  and  precious  hatred,  set  on  fire  of  hell,  alive  if  he  can  ;  let  the  North 
American  Indian  have  his,  and  hand  it  down  from  father  to  son,  by 
Heaven  knows  what  symbols  of  alligators,  and  rattlesnakes,  and  war  clubs 
smeared  with  veriuition  and  entwined  with  scarlet ;  let  such  a  country  as 
Poland,  cloven  to  the  earth,  the  armed  heel  on  the  radiant  forehead,  her 
body  dead,  her  soul  incapable  to  die,  let  her  "  remember  the  wrongs  of 
days  long  past ;"  let  the  lost  and  wandering  tribes  of  Israel  remember 
theits — tiie  manliness  and  the  sympathy  of  the  world  may  allow  or  pardon 
this  to  them ;  but  shall  America,  young,  free,  prosperous,  just  setting  out 
on  the  highway  of  Heaven,  "  decorating  and  cheering  the  elevated  sphere 
she  just  begins  to  move  in,  glittering  like  the  morning  star,  full  of  life  and 
joy,"  shall  she  be  supposed  to  be  polluting  and  corroding  her  noble  and 
happy  heart,  by  moping  over  old  stories  of  stamp  act,  and  tea  tax,  and  the 
firing  of  the  Leopard  upon  the  Chesapeake  in  a  time  of  peace  .'  No,  sir; 
no,  sir  ;  a  thousand  times  no !  Why,  I  protest  I  thought  all  that  had  been 
settled.  I  thought  two  wars  had  settled  it  all.  What  else  was  so  much 
good  blood  shed  for  on  so  m:tny  more  than  classical  fields  of  revolutionary 
3 


84 

||oi7  '  ^°'  ^^^^  w*  *o  much  good  blood  more  lately  shed  at  Lundy's 
Mtoe,  at  Fort  Erie,  before  and  behind  the  linei  at  New  Orleans,  on  the 
deck  of  the  Constitution,  on  the  deck  of  the  Java,  on  the  lakes,  on  the 
■ea,  but  to  settle  exactly  these  *'  wrongs  of  past  days  ?"  And  have  we 
come  back  sulky  and  sullen,  from  the  very  field  of  honor  ?  For  my  coun- 
try I  deny  it.  The  Senator  says  that  our  people  still  remember  these 
**  former  scenes  of  wrong  with  perhaps  too  deep"  a  sensibility ;  and  that, 
M  I  interpret  him,  they  nourish  a  <'  too  extensive"  national  enmity.  How 
so  ?  If  the  feeling  he  attributes  to  them  is  moral,  manly,  creditable,  how 
comes  it  to  be  too  deep ;  and  if  it  is  immoral,  unmanly,  and  unworthy,  why 
is  it  charged  on  them  at  all  ?  Is  there  a  member  of  this  body,  who  would 
stand  up  in  any  educated,  iu  any  intelligent  and  right-minded  circle  which 
he  respected,  and  avow,  that  for  his  part  he  must  acknowledge,  that,  look- 
ing back  through  the  glories  and  the  atonements  of  two  wars,  his  veins 
were  full  of  ill  blood  to  England ;  that  in  peace  he  could  not  help  being 
her  enemy ;  that  he  could  not  pluck  out  the  deep-wrought  convictions 
and  "  the  immortal  hate"  of  the  old  times  P  Certainly,  not  one.  And 
then,  sir,  that  which  we  feel  would  do  no  honor  to  ourselves,  shall  we 
confess  for  our  country  ? 

Mr.  President,  let  me  say,  that  in  my  judgment  this  notion  of  a  national 
enmity  of  feeling  towards  Great  Britain  belongs  to  a  past  age  of  our  his- 
tory. My  younger  countrymen  are  unconscious  of  it.  They  disavow  it. 
That  generation  in  whose  opinions  and  feelings  the  actions  and  the  desti- 
ny of  the  next  age  are  enfolded,  as  the  tree  in  the  germ,  do  not  at  all  com- 
prehend your  meaning,  nor  your  fears,  nor  your  regrets.  We  are  horn 
to  happier  feelings.  We  look  on  England  as  we  look  on  France.  We 
look  on  them,  from  our  new  world,  not  unrenowned,  yet  a  new  world 
still ;  and  the  blood  mounts  to  our  cheeks ;  our  eyes  swim ;  our  voices  are 
Utifled  with  emulousness  of  so  much  glory ;  their  trophies  will  not  let  us 
sleep ;  but  there  is  no  hatred  at  all ;  no  hatred ;  all  for  honor,  nothinc  for 
hate !  We  have,  we  can  have  no  barbarian  memory  of  wrongs,  for  which 
brave  meii  have  made  the  last  expiation  to  the  brave. 

No,  sir ;  if  public  men,  or  any  one  public  man,  think  it  thfcir  duty  to  make 
a  war  or  cultivate  the  dispositions  of  war  towards  any  nation,  let  them 
perform  the  duty,  and  have  done  with  it.  But  do  not  say  that  there  is  an 
unfortunate,  morbid,  impracticable  popular  temper  on  the  subject,  which  you 
desire  to  resist,  but  are  afraid  you  shall  not  be  able  to  resist.  If  you  will 
answer  for  the  politicians,  I  think  I  will  venture  to  answer  for  the  people 


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